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Kim Dokja had been back for a month when he noticed something wasn’t quite right. 

In hindsight, he should have realized it sooner. He should have realized it when, immediately upon waking from his thousands-year-long slumber in a sunny hospital room, Yoo Joonghyuk had grabbed his chin and then stared at him in silence for a long, long time until Kim Dokja, in a voice hoarse from disuse, nervously asked, “Yoo Joonghyuk?”

The fingers on his chin moved up to his cheek. “Kim Dokja,” Yoo Joonghyuk replied. 

His voice was so desperate and tender that Kim Dokja abruptly remembered that Han Sooyoung had crafted Yoo Joonghyuk from words and sentences solely for one person. 

For him.

That voice, that thumb brushing against his cheekbone, those tired, sorrowful eyes—they were all made for him. Every lifetime, every year, every breath—it was all for him. The weight of that reality had been painful enough while alone on that train, but now, with Yoo Joonghyuk stroking his cheek, the evidence of all the years he had suffered through on Kim Dokja’s behalf evident in the streaks of grey in his hair, the weight of Yoo Joonghyuk’s existence was so crushing that it suddenly became difficult to breathe.

Yoo Joonghyuk was Kim Dokja's salvation; he was Yoo Joonghyuk’s damnation. 

“Kim Dokja,” Yoo Joonghyuk said again. Softer, somehow. “Stop thinking, you fool.” And then he leaned over and kissed him. 

That was the moment he should have realized that something had shifted. Yoo Joonghyuk was a man who would take his emotions to the grave unless confronted about them directly, yet here he was, baring his soul raw. But Yoo Joonghyuk’s lips were on his, and he could smell Han Sooyoung’s lemon candy from somewhere in the distance, and the sound of his children’s excited voices was approaching from down the hall. He was back. He was home. The epilogue had not been finished; the possibilities were endless, just like the galaxies. Somehow, Kim Dokja knew that Yoo Joonghyuk had intentionally left it that way. For both of them.

For this. 

Kim Dokja stopped thinking, and he kissed Yoo Joonghyuk back. 

***

Life was peaceful. 

The large villa where the company lived had clearly been bought and furnished in a rush. When Lee Seolhwa informed them that Kim Dokja would soon regain consciousness, they had scrambled to fulfill the promise made long ago: to live together in a big house. Some rooms were still empty, and the walls were bare, but it was full of all the people Kim Dokja cared about most, and he was never alone. It was more than enough. It was everything. 

They had readied a bedroom overflowing with books and photo albums filled with images of the memories he had missed out on. It was proof of a life fully lived in his absence; it was proof that those thousands of years spent alone on that subway cart had been worth it. It wasn’t exactly the ending he had desired – he was pointedly missing from all of the photographs – but now that he had returned, such an ending was no longer out of reach. That was the promise contained behind those four walls: a future, together. Kim Dokja spent a singular night in the room his family had carefully crafted for him – that same night, a nightmare of the subway train violently woke him from his slumber. His screams woke the entire house, too. 

After that, he slept in Yoo Joonghyuk’s room.

He supposed it was their room now, but no matter how many nights Kim Dokja slept with his back pressed against Yoo Joonghyuk’s chest or how many mornings Yoo Joonghyuk casually kissed him over the coffee machine, he still found it difficult to believe that life was now something that they shared. It felt fragile, almost, like if Kim Dokja wanted it too much, the world would do what it had always done when he thought he had reached some semblance of happiness – break it. 

The first crack occurred when Yoo Joonghyuk collapsed. 

Kim Dokja was walking in circles around the vast living room, Lee Gilyoung on one side of him and Shin Yoosung on the other. He preferred to do his physical therapy walks outside, but it had snowed heavily overnight, and Han Sooyoung had threatened to break his legs before the ice on the sidewalk had the chance if he dared to try it. Yoo Joonghyuk sat at the kitchen table with Yoo Mia, patiently helping her slog through her calculus homework. He was better at that now, Kim Dokja noticed. Patience. Moving at a slower pace rather than rushing towards the finish line. Kim Dokja saw a lot of the 0th regression in this post-voyage Yoo Joonghyuk, and he cherished that more than he could ever hope to put in words. This was a version of Yoo Joonghyuk who, after 1865 regressions, had the potential for happiness again. 

Finally. 

As Kim Dokja continued his laps and the kids chattered aimlessly about their plans for their upcoming Christmas break, he peered outside the window and watched Lee Hyunsung and Jung Heewon chop firewood to add to the slowly dwindling flames in the furnace. Yoo Sangah sat on a bench on the porch, sipping tea, and Han Sooyoung lay comfortably across her lap. She ran her mouth about something that made Yoo Sangah fondly shake her head.

Kim Dokja would have endured a million more years on that train if it meant that when it finally came to a stop, this sight would be waiting for him on the other side of the doors. 

Then, there was a loud clatter from the kitchen, and Yoo Mia frantically shouted, “Oppa!” 

There was a shattered coffee mug on the floor. Amidst the shards of ceramic lay Yoo Joonghyuk. 

***

“A heart attack?” Han Sooyoung pointed accusingly at Yoo Joonghyuk. “This bastard puts kale in his smoothies! He goes on a run every morning like a freak! You’re telling me that he had a heart attack? He’s only, like, thirty-four!”

Yoo Joonghyuk was still unconscious, but he was stable. It had been at least an hour since Yoo Joonghyuk successfully made it out of surgery, but Kim Dokja was still numb from the shock of scrambling over to where Joonghyuk lay on the kitchen floor and failing to find a pulse on his neck. He sat beside Yoo Joonghyuk’s hospital bed, hands clasped tightly in his lap, too afraid to touch him. He couldn’t bear to risk causing another crack to appear. How many would it take until he shattered completely? Instead, Kim Dokja silently watched his chest rise and fall. He listened to the rhythmic beeping of the heart rate monitor. He counted every scar, mole, and eyelash on Yoo Joonghyuk’s face, and then did it again. And again. It felt a lot like watching Yoo Joonghyuk from the subway windows – so close, but so out of reach. 

Lee Seolhwa said, “Physically. He’s physically around thirty-four.”

“Well, duh? Isn’t that what I just said?”

It did not take a reader to read between those vast lines. 

“He’s aging,” Kim Dokja said. 

Han Sooyoung glanced at Yoo Joonghyuk—just as youthful as he had been at the start of the scenarios, other than the gray hairs, which were more a result of stress than anything else—and then looked at Kim Dokja as if he had grown an additional limb. 

“He’s aging, right? Internally,” Kim Dokja continued, his mouth dry. “He was on that Ark for over a hundred years. Now that he’s back on Earth, it’s catching up to him. The clock started ticking again.”

He waited for Lee Seolhwa to tell him that he was wrong, that he was assuming the worst, as always. He prayed for it. But the only god here was Kim Dokja, and he had forfeited his ability to dream up ways to change the fate of Yoo Joonghyuk in exchange for a life with him and the others. There was nobody to answer his prayers anymore. There never really had been.

Lee Seolhwa only hung her head. 

“How long does he have left?” Kim Dokja asked. 

“A few months, maybe,” Lee Seolhwa said solemnly. 

“Maybe?”

“A few months.” Lee Seolhwa pulled up another chair and rested her arm on Yoo Joonghyuk’s shoulder. At that moment, she was not Yoo Joonghyuk’s doctor. She was his companion. His friend. In a past life, his lover. Perhaps they weren’t as close as in previous regressions, but their souls were permanently intertwined. “I will make sure he lasts a few more months, Dokja-ssi. I promise.”

A few more months. 

Kim Dokja could no longer resist. He leaned over the bed rail and stroked the patch of gray hair at Yoo Joonghyuk’s temple, the same one he’d press his lips to before bed each night. After the 0th round, he never thought he would have the luxury of watching Yoo Joonghyuk grow old again. When he first returned to this world and saw the streaks of gray in Yoo Joonghyuk’s hair, he was delighted to prove that theory wrong. To grow old alongside his oldest friend – no, Yoo Joonghyuk was always more than that, even before their relationship progressed, wasn’t he? No words in any language could possibly describe what Yoo Joonghyuk meant to him. But to grow old alongside him was the first happy dream that Kim Dokja had ever imagined for himself. It was the first time he dared. 

He remembered now why he hadn’t in the past. If you had nothing and wanted nothing, there was nothing to lose. 

He continued silently stroking Yoo Joonghyuk’s hair while Lee Seolhwa and Han Sooyoung discussed the next course of action—his end-of-life care . Kim Dokja tuned them out. It didn’t matter. A few months was plenty of time. 

There were three ways to survive in a ruined world. Kim Dokja would find a fourth. 

***

Yoo Joonghyuk was released from the hospital after a few days, and Kim Dokja refused to leave his side. At first, it was necessary. There wasn’t much Yoo Joonghyuk could do without assistance, and Kim Dokja was more than happy to take on that role. It wasn’t as if Yoo Joonghyuk would allow anyone else to help him eat or bathe or get dressed, after all. When Yoo Joonghyuk finally regained his strength after a few weeks of recovery, Kim Dokja was almost remorseful that he was no longer needed to such an extent. He told Yoo Joonghyuk as much in bed one morning, arms wrapped around Yoo Joonghyuk’s back as he lazily mouthed at Kim Dokja’s bare neck, shoulders, collarbones. 

“Don’t you have enough children to take care of?” Yoo Joonghyuk retorted against his throat.

“That doesn’t count! I’m an absent father, remember? I missed out on the years when they actually needed me.” He pinched Yoo Joonghyuk’s ear, hard. “Besides, isn’t that rich coming from you? You ran a whole orphanage full of children. With your wife.”

“Wasn’t me. Wasn’t my orphanage. Wasn’t my wife.” 

“Well, I’m still jealous,” Kim Dokja said dramatically. He patted Joonghyuk’s back. “But don’t worry. You can make it up to me by pretending to be useless and letting me take care of you for a few more weeks.”

Yoo Joonghyuk rolled his eyes. “Weeks? You’re a fool.”

“Would months be better? You’re right. Correction – you can make it up to me by pretending to be a useless bastard and letting me take care of you for a couple more mo –hmph!” 

Yoo Joonghyuk’s lips muffled his words. There were worse ways to be interrupted. Kim Dokja pulled him closer by the back of his neck and kissed him deeply. Yoo Joonghyuk’s warm, callused hands ran down Kim Dokja’s bare abdomen and continued downwards until Kim Dokja was flushed from head to toe and panting pathetically into Yoo Joonghyuk’s mouth. 

Kim Dokja couldn’t help himself. He murmured, “So, is this Plan B, then? Putting a baby in me to take care of inste– ah, Yoo Joonghyuk, you bastard, slow down! I was joking! It was a joke!” 

It was a good distraction until it wasn’t. After one round, Yoo Joonghyuk rolled onto his back, breathing unsteadily. He was nearly as pale as the sheets, except for his lips, which were faintly blue beneath the sunlight streaming in through the cracked blinds. Kim Dokja sat up in a panic and was about to fetch Lee Seolhwa despite their compromised state when Yoo Joonghyuk caught him by the wrist and pulled him back to the bed. 

“Don’t,” Yoo Joonghyuk said weakly. “I’m fine. Give me a second.” 

Every instinct told Dokja to ignore his request, but Yoo Joonghyuk sucked in one strangled breath after the other, and after a few minutes, they began to sound a bit less pained. Color slowly returned to Yoo Joonghyuk’s cheek. Kim Dokja didn’t know whether to laugh or cry as he stared down at his partner, who was alive but simultaneously dying, right in front of him. Yoo Joonghyuk had lived through over a thousand lifetimes to find him again, succeeded, and then, upon losing him once more, had wandered alone in the ether for over a century for one last chance to reach the end together. 

And there was nothing Kim Dokja could do to return the favor. Or, rather, there was one, but it in moments like this, it felt more like giving up than redemption. 

Since returning from the hospital, Kim Dokja would creep into his old bedroom-turned-office once Yoo Joonghyuk and their other companions were asleep, pull up Ways of Survival on his laptop, and search for the answers that he so desperately needed within those familiar lines of text. He must have missed something – an answer he had forgotten, a lead he could follow. After the first reread, Kim Dokja had nothing. After the second reread, he still had nothing. Why was it easier to bring a person back from the dead in this world than it was to prevent it in the first place? His desperation grew more and more profound with each chapter he read. So did his exhaustion. During the day, he acted as Yoo Joonghyuk’s caretaker, cared for the children, attended physical therapy; at night, he read. There was little time for sleep. 

If Han Sooyoung could spend an entire sleepless decade writing Ways of Survival to save him, then Kim Dokja could do this much to save Yoo Joonghyuk. He was a reader, above all else. It was the only way he had to win this final scenario. 

But when he entered his office on the night he intended to start his third reread, Han Sooyoung was sitting on the plush armchair, a magazine on her lap and a lemon lollipop between her lips. 

“Caught you,” she said. 

Kim Dokja quickly masked his surprise. “Caught me doing what? Why are you sitting here in the dark?” He flicked on the light. “I came here to read so I wouldn't bother Joonghyuk with the light from my phone. So get off my chair, would you?”

Han Sooyoung didn't even bother to look up from her magazine. 

[The constellation 'Director of the False Last Act' has used 'Lie Detection Lv. 10'.]

[The constellation ‘Director of the False Last Act’ has confirmed that the statement is false.]

She licked her finger and silently flipped to the next page. 

Damn. 

Irritated, Dokja sat at his desk, then froze at the sight before him. All of his notebooks were spread out across the wood when they should have been carefully hidden behind a shelf of books that he had been certain nobody would reach for. She had seen every plan – most of which involved sacrificing himself in one way or another. It meant going far, far away. So it goes. 

“I can’t just let him die,” Kim Dokja said. He hated how terrified he sounded. How defeated. “After all you did to get me back, how can you expect me not to do the same for him?”

Han Sooyoung threw her magazine on the floor and glared fiercely across the room at him.  “Did dying so many times turn you stupid? Don’t you get it? If you save him, he saves you. If he saves you, then you save him. The cycle will never end. The train will never stop , Kim Dokja. You’ll be stuck on it forever—both of you. You’ll watch everyone else live through the windows but never get to live it yourself. Is that what you want? After everything we did to get you back, that’s the path you want to choose, you idiot?”

“What other choice do I have? Besides, I never intended to leave the train in the first place. You decided that for me.” 

“Wake the hell up, Kim Dokja! Do you think he even wants to live in a world without you in it? Do you think it is even possible? I created him for you, idiot! He has no life without you in it!” Han Sooyoung stood up and slammed her palms against the desk. “He hasn’t told you his ◼️◼️ yet, has he? He finally got it, you know. The second your stories started telling again, he got it.”

The silence was thick.

“It’s you.” 

“‘You’?”

“No, idiot. You .” She jabbed her finger against his sternum. “You. ‘Kim Dokja.’”

“Stop.” 

“No. I need you to hear me.” Han Sooyoung held his hands tightly as they raised to cover his face. They were trembling. “Sacrificing yourself to save him would be the most selfish thing you could possibly do, and you know it. He would spend the rest of his life regressing – maybe not literally, but figuratively. Mentally. He would never stop trying to get you back. Tell me you understand that, Kim Dokja. You would send him right back to the Hell of Eternity. That, or he would just end his life like he tried to do the last time you left him. And then – fuck, you bastard, what about the rest of us? What about me? What about all I did, all I sacrificed, to save your life? What the hell am I supposed to do without either of you here?” She dropped his hands and pushed his chest, hard. The unfamiliar sight of tears in Han Sooyoung’s eyes made Kim Dokja’s heart ache in ways he didn’t know was possible. “I’m tired, Kim Dokja. I’m so fucking tired. Aren’t you?” 

He thought the question was directed at him until a low voice answered from the doorway. “Yes.”

Kim Dokja’s head whipped towards Yoo Joonghyuk in a panic. He approached the desk and wiped at Kim Dokja’s cheeks with the sleeves of his sweatshirt, then pulled him into a crushing hug. Their hearts beat in tandem. For now, they were both alive. All three of them were. 

Quietly, so only Kim Dokja could hear, Yoo Joonhyuk said, “I’ve lived thousands of lives, Kim Dokja. I did it of my own free will. All for you. I have no regrets.” He pressed his nose against the junction between Kim Dokja’s neck and shoulder. “Don’t waste the time we have left reading a story that has already ended, about versions of me that no longer exist. I’m right here.”

Kim Dokja swallowed the ball in his throat. He breathed in Yoo Joonghyuk’s warm scent. 

“It didn’t work out so well in the past. Living without you,” Kim Dokja whispered back.

Yoo Joonghyuk stiffened at the mention of his suicide attempt. Then, slowly, he relaxed. “That story ended, too.”

It was a truth that Kim Dokja could not deny. He was no longer the same Kim Dokja who had nothing to live for but Yoo Joonghyuk, even if, for some reason, that pained him to admit. He had children who needed him. He had companions who went through hell and back to live this life side by side. There was Han Sooyoung, who sacrificed thousands of worlds and millions of people just to save him. What would have been the point of that sacrifice if Kim Dokja had just thrown it away? The truth was, even without Yoo Joonghuk, this was a story that Kim Dokja wanted to see the end of. He wanted to see his children graduate. He wanted to attend Jung Heewon and Lee Hyunsung’s wedding. He wanted to eat pizza by the Han River, and he wanted to read Han Sooyoung’s next book. He wanted this epilogue to go on for eternity. More than that, he wanted to be a part of it. 

He was not the same Kim Dokja from the past. He did not want to survive anymore. He wanted to live. Admitting that felt selfish, almost, knowing that he could choose between the two and Yoo Joonghyuk could not. Did that mean that Kim Dokja did not love him enough? That he did not deserve Yoo Joonghyuk’s endless devotion? That he – 

“Kim Dokja.” Yoo Joonghyuk gripped his chin. “Stop thinking, you fool.” And then he kissed Dokja softly, grounding him, and it was as if he had woken up from another thousands-year-long slumber. 

Maybe Yoo Joonghyuk did not get to choose between survival or life, but for the first time, Yoo Joonghyuk was in control of his own destiny. And this was the story he wanted to tell. This was the only way to end the ‘Hell of Eternity’ – to let it reach the final chapter. 

There was one way that Kim Dokja could make up for the endless tragedies he had subjected Yoo Joonghyuk to for thousands and thousands of years, after all. By letting him go. By making the most of the time they had left. By forgetting about the past and the future, and by living in the present.

As Kim Dokja watched Yoo Joonghyuk slowly compose himself after their early morning rendezvous, he had to remind himself of the conclusions he had reached in the office that night. There might have been three ways to survive in a ruined world, but there was only one way to live in it: to reach the end. Life without death was meaningless. And after all he went through to reach this point, Yoo Joonghyuk deserved to leave behind a life that meant something. If that required letting it end, Kim Dokja would do just that, even if that meant living the rest of his life without Yoo Joonghyuk by his side. That was his redemption. 

Rather than ask if he was okay, Kim Dokja waited until Yoo Joonghyuk’s eyes cleared, then crawled on top of him. “Say it.” 

Yoo Joonghyuk held him by the hips. “Why must I say it if you already know it's true?” 

“Well, let’s see,” Kim Dokja said. He held up a finger. “First, you’re dying on me. Like a bastard.” Another finger. “Second, I’m still turned on, and you’re too old to get it up again, so I think I –”

“Do you ever shut up?” Yoo Joonghyuk slapped a hand over his mouth. “I love you.”

“Say it again.” 

“Have you gone deaf?”

A third finger. “Third, I had to watch you marry Lee Seolhwa–”

“I love you.” 

“Again.” 

***

“Are you doing the thing that cats do? You know, when they run off to go die alone so they don’t traumatize their owner?”

Yoo Joonghyuk blinked at Kim Dokja, then spooned some meat onto his plate. He did not justify such a statement with a response. 

“No, seriously. Where the hell have you and Han Sooyoung been running off to? You’re starting to freak me out.” He pointed accusingly at Yoo Joonghyuk with his chopsticks. “Tell me what you two are up to.”

“Or what? And don't talk with your mouth full.” Yoo Joonghyuk served some rice and side dishes to his sister and the other kids. They chatted amongst each other, unphased by the bickering. 

Kim Dokja swallowed his food. “Joonghyuk-ah,” he whined dramatically, which earned him another incredulous look. Yoo Mia pretended to retch into her backpack. “Tell me.” 

When Han Sooyoung returned from work for the past three weeks, Yoo Joonghyuk stopped whatever he was doing, pulled on a coat, and told Kim Dokja he would return soon. Then, the two of them vanished for several hours straight.

The first couple of times it happened, Kim Dokja was thrilled. He knew from the others that Han Sooyoung and Yoo Joonghyuk had tentatively become friends in his absence, and it was nice to witness the two people he loved most enjoying each other’s company. After the third outing without an invitation, however, Kim Dokja was a little hurt. But by the fifth time, he was no longer hurt but wildly suspicious. Yoo Joonghyuk was not a social person. Even if Kim Dokja himself were too clingy on a particular day, Yoo Joonghyuk would grab his cheeks in both hands, kiss him, and kindly suggest that he entertain the kids for a while. But with anyone else? Thirty minutes of one-on-one time with any of their companions seemed to be Yoo Joonghyuk’s limit before he would not-so-kindly request that they leave him alone. So what the hell was he doing with Han Sooyoung for several hours every weeknight? Incarnation and constellation bond aside, it was still too strange for Kim Dokja to wrap his head around. He knew them both too well. 

“Just tell him, Oppa,” Yoo Mia shuddered. “He’s going to start calling you pet names next.” 

“That is a great idea, Yoo Mia, thank you! Joonghyuk-ie, sweetheart, honey, baby–” 

Both of the Yoo siblings went pale. For entirely different reasons. 

“Alright. Jesus. Stop that,” Yoo Joonghyuk said. “I’ll show you after you drop the children off at school.”

“Was that so hard?” Kim Dokja leaned across the kitchen island and affectionately scratched beneath Yoo Joonghyuk’s chin. 

The kids burst into a symphony of exaggerated groans and gags– it was rare that they showed affection in front of the others. Kim Dokja shoved a few more bites of food into his mouth before ushering the kids to the front door like a bunch of ducklings. Since the other companions were employed, Kim Dokja’s job had naturally become that of Yoo Joonghyuk’s caretaker, as well as the one responsible for driving the children to and from school. The villa was just outside Seoul, and none of the kids were particularly fond of using the subway. Admittedly, Kim Dokja felt a bit useless at times, like a dried-up housewife, but most of the time, Kim Dokja reveled in the simplicity of his life. He ate breakfast with Yoo Joonghyuk. He took his kids to school. He spent the rest of the day with Yoo Joonghyuk, reading or playing video games or talking or wrestling in the sheets when Yoo Joonghyuk had the energy to spare. Sometimes, they went on walks. Sometimes, Yoo Joonghyuk slept all day. But Kim Dokja was there for it all. He would never take that for granted again: to be a participant in his companion’s mundane lives rather than an omniscient viewer. Later in the evening, the companions would return home; they cooked and ate dinner together. It was better than a dream. It was real. 

Only the clock was ticking on Yoo Joonghyuk’s life, and Kim Dokja couldn’t forget that, no matter how happy he felt. Sometimes the happiness turned into such a profound sense of guilt that he found it difficult to do much else besides shake and struggle for air. 

For example, that day, after all the kids had piled out of the car, and he was left alone, watching them walk away through the window. 

What would happen to Yoo Joonghyuk after he died? Kim Dokja was not a religious person. He did not believe in an afterlife where everything was perfect and good. But wasn’t that too cruel? That in all of Yoo Joonghyuk’s long, torturous life, he only got a few months of happiness before he was cast into the ether? 

The episode continued – panic attacks, Lee Seolhwa called them, but Kim Dokja despised that term – until Yoo Joonghyuk sent him a text that brought him back to where he had promised to stay. The present. 

Come home. -YJH

Home. He had one of those now. He had nine of them. Kim Dokja caught his breath, dried his tears, and drove back to the villa, though his hands shook around the wheel for the duration of the drive. Yoo Joonghyuk was waiting for him on the porch when he arrived. He rose from the steps and swung the driver’s side door open. 

“Hop over. I’ll drive,” Yoo Joonghyuk said. He frowned and thumbed at the puffy skin beneath Kim Dokja’s eyes. “You were crying.” 

“Emphasis on were ,” Kim Dokja replied as he climbed into the passenger seat. He did not want to start panicking again in front of Yoo Joonhyuk, and if they talked about, he would, so he quickly changed the subject. “So, where are we going? Do I get a clue?”

Thankfully, Yoo Joonghyuk dropped it. “No. It’s a surprise.”

However, he kept a hand on Kim Dokja’s thigh for the entire drive, which he never usually did, and talked much more than usual, which Kim Dokja appreciated. It drowned out the darker thoughts. He listened to the comforting lull of Yoo Joonghyuk’s voice and watched the landscape of Seoul pass through the glass in colorful streaks of light, and by the time they came to a stop in front of a quaint but relatively crowded street, the storm had passed. 

Yoo Joonghyuk grabbed Kim Dokja’s hand when they met on the sidewalk and continued holding it as they headed down the narrow street. Hand-holding was another thing that Yoo Joonghyuk rarely instigated. Kim Dokja thought that maybe he should cry more often. The overcompensation wasn’t unwelcome. 

As they approached a storefront concealed behind white paper-covered windows, Yoo Joonghyuk stopped, dropped his hand, and pulled out a pair of keys from his coat pocket. Kim Dokja raised a brow as Yoo Joonghyuk handed them to him. 

“I’m confused,” Kim Dokja said. 

“About how keys work? Open the door.” 

“I really hate that punching you is considered a crime now.”

He opened the door as instructed, if only to escape from the abrasively cold winter air. The building was pitch black inside due to the paper blocking the sun. There was shuffling from somewhere to his left, and then the lights flickered on. Kim Dokja blinked through the sudden barrage of light. When his eyes finally adjusted, his heart stuttered in his chest. 

It was a bookstore. 

There was nothing especially spectacular about it – it was quite old and small, and the entire place smelled like dust and wet paint. Above, a section of the roof had been crudely patched up with wood boards; most of the books were damaged from years of being subjected to the elements. Only a small corner of the establishment, the floor covered in a tarp littered with paint brushes and tools, showed any indication that life had existed in this place in the twenty-something years since the scenarios ended. 

“We wanted to fix it up more before we showed it to you,” Yoo Joonghyuk explained as he looked around the shop, arms crossed. “When you were gone, I did not know what to do with myself. I tried going back to my old life. It didn’t work. I imagine it will be the same for you. Han Sooyoung suggested we buy this place for that reason.” He ran his finger across a dusty shelf. “You can manage it if you want. Or you can have someone else manage it. You can have the kids work here. You can be a visitor. You can sell it. It doesn’t matter. It’s yours. You can do whatever you want with it. But it will give you something to do. Other than terrorism.”

Kim Dokja laughed at that, then blinked back his tears before they could fall again. This time, though, the tears weren’t necessarily out of sadness, nor could he confidently say they came from a place of happiness. What Yoo Joonghyuk and Han Sooyoung had gifted him was not just a bookstore but a future—more specifically, a future without Yoo Joonghyuk. It was a fourth way to survive in this world, a foundation to learn how to keep living. 

“Yoo Joonghyuk,” Kim Dokja said. He still stood in the center of the bookstore, taking it all in. “Let’s get married.” 

Yoo Joonghyuk blinked at him dumbly. “What?”

“You heard me. It’s legal now, you know. What, you don’t want to marry me?”

“I didn’t say that,” Yoo Joonghyuk corrected. He joined Kim Dokja in the center of the room. Water from the poorly patched roof dripped onto his face. “It just seems…cruel. To you. That’s the only reason I haven’t asked.” 

Kim Dokja let out a long breath. “I don’t care if it's cruel,” he said firmly. “That’s what you want, right? To live like you’re alive with the time you have left, not like you’re dying? If you weren’t dying, we’d get married. So we should do it.” He nudged Yoo Joonghyuk with his elbow. “Besides, I hate calling you my boyfriend. It sounds like we’re in middle school.”

“You’re ridiculous.” But then those eyes of his – those damn eyes, so dark, so clear, no longer filled by all the misfortunes in the world but rather with all the hope– softened immensely. “A wedding won’t be necessary. I don’t want any of those fools there. Just you and me.”

“Well, God. Aren’t you a romantic?” Kim Dokja snorted. He pulled Yoo Joonghyuk closer by the hem of his shirt. “Is that a yes, then?”

“Of course.” 

Their lips met just as a loud clap of thunder sounded from outside. The electricity flickered out, and they were plunged into darkness. They kept kissing. 

***

The bad days began to outnumber the good. 

For a while, Kim Dokja almost forgot that Yoo Joonghyuk was sick at all. Besides the fact that he got winded quicker than usual, Kim Dokja did not notice much difference in his demeanor. And then, one day, Yoo Joonghyuk slept in. They had stayed up late the night prior, so Kim Dokja did not question it. He let him sleep. He took over breakfast duties. Drove the kids to school. Ran a couple of errands. Had lunch with Han Sooyoung and Lee Jihye at the university. Picked up some groceries. 

When he returned home after picking up the children, Yoo Joonghyuk was still in bed. 

He did not leave it much after that afternoon. Neither did Kim Dokja. He read books beside Yoo Joonghyuk or helped him get through games his hands were now too shaky to play himself. Once a week, the entire company would gather in their bedroom, eat dinner together on the large king bed, and then watch a film. Under normal circumstances, Yoo Joonghyuk would promptly kick anyone who wasn’t Yoo Mia from the room. But he did not fight against these weekly gatherings. He did not push Lee Jihye’s head off his shoulder when she inevitably fell asleep halfway through the movie. He did not scold Lee Gilyoung for clinging to Kim Dokja like a leech. He did not yell at Han Sooyoung for getting popcorn in their sheets. The resignation made Kim Dokja’s stomach churn.

One day, Yoo Joonghyuk asked for pain medication, which he had venomously refused whenever Lee Seolhwa had offered it to him in the past. It made him groggy, and he wanted to be present. Then, one morning, after a particularly difficult night, he had asked Kim Dokja to fetch Lee Seolhwa. And that was when Kim Dokja knew for sure that the end was near. 

Lee Seolhwa had promised him a few months. It had been five. Yoo Joonghyuk’s innate tenacity to survive could only take him so far. The finish line was approaching; this was not a race he could forfeit. 

“Do you want to go to the hospital?” Kim Dokja asked. He lay on the bed beside Yoo Joonghyuk, carefully inspecting his side profile. He was still stupidly gorgeous, even as the end neared, but his cheeks were gaunt, his skin was an ashen shade of gray, and he had an oxygen tube sticking out of his nose. “You’ll be more comfortable there.” 

“You won’t be,” Yoo Joonghyuk murmured. His eyes were half closed, long lashes casting shadows down his face. 

“Don’t be stupid. If you’re comfortable, I’ll be comfortable.” He brushed his fingers through Yoo Joonghyuk’s hair. It was damp with sweat. “I’ll tell Lee Seolhwa we’re coming. Okay?”

Yoo Joonghyuk’s left eyebrow quivered. 

Kim Dokja ran his thumb across it. “Are you scared?” he asked softly. 

After a while, Yoo Joonghyuk said, “I am used to death being a comma. Not a period.”

A ball formed in Kim Dokja’s throat. He swallowed it down and forced a smile. He hoped it came off as reassuring rather than pained, but it was impossible to tell. “Maybe the next sentence will be even better than the last. You never know.”

“Hm.” Without opening his eyes, Yoo Joonghyuk said, “She was wrong.”

“Who was wrong?”

“Han Sooyoung. In the office. She said that if you died, I wouldn’t be able to live without you. She was wrong,” Yoo Joonghyuk explained. His chest rattled with each word. “At first, that was the case. But after I came back from searching for you, things were different. I would have lived. I would have made stories to tell you when we met again.”

When. Not if. Kim Dokja took it as a promise.

A few hours later, he was admitted to the nicest room in Lee Seolhwa’s hospital. 

When Kim Dokja awoke the following day in the small hospital cot, the body beneath his cheek was cold. No matter how hard he listened, there was no heartbeat to be found. Only his own. It was beating alone.

Kim Dokja sat in that silence for a long, long time. 

[Story, ‘Life and Death Companions,’ has stopped its storytelling.]

***

Kim Dokja did not cry. He did not cry at the wake, or the funeral, or at the seemingly endless events that followed the death of one of Seoul’s most infamous heroes. He did not cry when he returned to their empty bedroom, or when he went to sleep alone each night, or when his companions shot him worried glances across the dinner table as he talked and laughed as if nothing had changed. He wanted to cry, to scream, to throw himself on the ground like he did when he was a little kid, and the tragedy of his existence became too much to handle. But he had made a promise. He would continue to live on. That was the only path to redemption. What other choice he did have?

There were times, of course, when he wanted to break that promise, to get back on that subway, somehow, and bring Yoo Joonghyuk back. Sometimes, he wished to jump out of another window, and he would not miscalculate this time. He thought that maybe The Ways of Survival could save him again like it always had, but when he tried to read it in the days following Yoo Joonghyuk’s death, he found that it had the opposite effect. It was as Yoo Joonghyuk had said – those were versions of Yoo Joonghyuk that no longer existed. But, then, neither did the Yoo Joonghyuk that had existed for Kim Dokja. Yoo Joonghyuk did not exist at all anymore. He was a memory. An ancient story. And it was a story that was too painful to reread. 

He often thought about what Yoo Joonghyuk had said to him before he was admitted to the hospital. I would have made stories to tell you when we met again. So, Kim Dokja did not cry. He did not wallow. He kept pressing through the darkness. 

He spent most of his time in the bookstore – painting walls, fixing shelves, sorting through shipments of new books and donated used ones. He was never alone. Yoo Mia, in particular, had become attached to his hip, perhaps seeking the comfort of the one other person who understood the true depths of her grief. Yoo Joonghyuk had sacrificed his life to raise both of them, whether he knew it or not. Nobody else could understand what it meant to lose that. In the morning, Lee Jihye accompanied him to the bookstore. She chatted aimlessly about school and her friends and how strict of a grader Han Sooyoung was. Sometimes, she would break down in tears, and Kim Dokja would comfort her, which only made her cry harder. When Lee Jihye left for her classes, the other companions appeared in the bookstore in turns throughout the day. They called it keeping him company, but Kim Dokja wasn’t a fool. They were babysitting him, ensuring that he did not do anything rash. Kim Dokja couldn’t blame them. When everyone was off work in the evenings, they would drag him back home against his will. Force him to eat. Bathe. Sleep. Rest. Kim Dokja was too exhausted to fight them. 

Han Sooyoung sat on the edge of his bed one of the nights she was assigned to ensure Kim Dokja slept without harm. Nobody had dared to bring up Yoo Joonghyuk in his presence until then, terrified that if they pushed too hard, they would lose more of Kim Dokja than they already had. Every day already felt like losing another percentage of the 100% Kim Dokja that they had fought so hard to bring back. 

But Han Sooyoung couldn’t hold it in anymore. “I miss that stupid bastard,” she said.

Kim Dokja counted to five. Swallowed down the tears. “Me too.” 

She was silent for a stretch. Then, she said, “I’ve been thinking about it a lot – what happens after we die, I mean. And I think he reincarnated. He reincarnated, and his soul probably found a fragment of your stupid soul in some other worldline because you’re bound by fate or some romantic bullshit like that, and you two are probably so happy together that it kind of makes me want to vomit just thinking about it.” 

His chest ached so profoundly that he thought his heart might stop right then and there. It didn’t. 

“It's a nice story.” 

Han Sooyoung sighed. “Bullshit. Move over.” She shoved him aside and laid down beside him. “He deserved it more than anyone. A long life with you. With all of us. A happy fucking ending. That’s the kind of story he deserved, not some bullshit fairytale. Fuck.”

It was too dark in the room to see, but Kim Dokja heard her sporadically sniffling. 

Hearing those words – the ones that Kim Dokja had felt himself since Yoo Joonghyuk died, or perhaps even before then, since that night in the office when he had begrudgingly accepted fate– made something shatter inside of him. It was the wall he had built up in order to stay true to his promise to Yoo Joonghyuk. Now, it was gone. 

Moisture gathered in Kim Dokja’s eyes. 

“He would want you to move on and be happy, Kim Dokja,” Han Sooyoung continued earnestly. “But that means he would want you to grieve properly, too. You don’t have to live in the present right now. You can hit pause. That’s okay. He would understand. When you’re ready to push play again, the present will still be there. We’ll wait for you. We’ll always wait for you.” 

When the tears finally fell, they would not stop. 

***

It got worse before it got better. 

With what felt like permission to mourn, Kim Dokja allowed himself to sink into the grief. Or, rather, the grief pulled him violently beneath its waves, and while sometimes it felt like he'd never regain the strength to resurface for air, he would then feel a rope tied securely around his waist, the other end of which was held by his companions. They would not let him drown. They would pull him out of the water before that happened. What else was there to believe in if he couldn’t believe in that?

Mainly, he lay in bed on Yoo Joonghyuk's side, wearing one of his sweatshirts. He dreaded the day his scent would fade from the clothes he left behind. 

Sometimes, he would talk to Yoo Joonghyuk through Midday Tryst. They hadn't used the skill since Kim Dokja returned – with cell service, it was no longer necessary. But Kim Dokja remembered that Yoo Joonghyuk had done the same when he thought Kim Dokja was gone after Dark Castle, and it brought him some comfort to follow in his footsteps. Yoo Joonghyuk had survived that loss. So would he. It didn't matter if Yoo Joonghyuk would not return as Kim Dokja had – what mattered was that the thought got him through to the next day, lie or not.  

Other times, Kim Dokja would try the tried-and-true trick from his childhood. 

“I'm Yoo Joonghyuk,” he said into the empty room. 

It did not work as well as it once had. 

He was rarely alone, but his companions did not bother him. They were just there. It was enough. The kids did homework on the large bed, and Kim Dokja would listen to them bicker amongst each other as he sat beside them, sometimes reading a novel on his phone, or sometimes staring off into nothingness. Their presence was a necessary reminder that things outside the room still mattered. Algebra still mattered. Crushes at school still mattered. Life went on. One day, Kim Dokja would join them. 

One day. 

He preferred Yoo Mia's company the most. She would curl up on the bed beside Kim Dokja, wrap herself in one of Yoo Joonghyuk's sweaters, and cry. Sometimes only for a few minutes, sometimes for hours. Kim Dokja joined her. They didn't talk much, but words weren't necessary. He felt less alone when she was present.

When Han Sooyoung kept him company, she talked more than the others. She told him about her job and the progress of the bookstore, and eventually, she started to tell him about her next novel. Kim Dokja enjoyed those ramblings the most. She wrote for one reader, after all. The story perfectly suited his tastes. He would close his eyes and let the story play out like a movie in his head. The book was about an immortal and a time traveler, companions separated by life and death. It was a good story. Kim Dokja hoped it had a happy ending. 

Jung Heewon was the least patient with him. 

“It's been three months, Kim Dokja,” Jung Heewon said. She sat on a chair beside his bed and attempted to crochet something that looked like nothing more than a tangled ball of blue yarn. “Han Sooyoung says to give you time. Maybe she's right. She knows you best, after all. But do you know what I think?” She looked at her mess of a crotchet project, sighed, and then handed it to Kim Dokja, who tiredly accepted it. “I think you have spent enough time watching the rest of us live life without you. Thousands of years, if I'm correct. I think it is time to leave that god-awful train once and for all. You won’t be the same. The grief won't go away. I know that. But, then, you don't really want it to, right? The pain is proof that he lived a good life. Otherwise, it wouldn't hurt like this.”

Kim Dokja ran his fingers across the two small blue clumps in his hands and listened carefully to Jung Heewon's words. 

“My mom killed herself when I was a teenager. Have I ever told you that?” Jung Heewon rested her elbow on her crossed legs, then propped her chin in her palm. She stared out the distant window. “I let the grief consume me too. She didn't leave a note. She never even told me she was struggling. She just – left. I was sad, but I was angry, too. I don’t even really know why I was angry. Maybe because I couldn't save her. Because she didn't even give me the chance. I started drinking a lot. Doing drugs. Anything to prevent my life from moving forward, really. I was determined to remain in the past until I found the answers I felt I deserved, and you know what became of my future, Dokja-ssi? Nothing. I had nothing. I was nothing. I was a human shell that existed to hold all of my grief and anger, and that was it. Then I met you.”

Their eyes met. Jung Heewon smiled sadly down at him. “You taught me to fight. You taught me to survive. You taught me that it is always worth flipping to the next page – that the story we leave behind is only as great as we make it. I learned I had yet to meet all the people I would ever love or who would love me. My life didn't end when my mother's did. A new chapter just began. Dokja-ssi, I know I'm terrible at crocheting, but look at that again, would you?”

With his heart twisting painfully against his sternum, Kim Dokja examined the blue blobs closer. It was a pair of socks. 

Baby socks.

He sat up straighter in bed. “You're pregnant?”

Jung Heewon smiled again. This time, a few tears rolled down her cheek. She reached over and grabbed his hand so tightly that it hurt. 

“Life goes on, Dokja-ssi. With or without you,” she said softly. “But I hope it's with you. I really hope it's with you.” 

She released his hand, patted his cheek, and left the room, the door clicking shut behind her. 

Kim Dokja stared down at the terribly made socks until the sunset behind the horizon and the room turned dark. 

The next day, he joined his companions for breakfast. He expected (and dreaded) for them to make a huge commotion over his sudden appearance, but even now, after all these years, he often forgot how well these people knew him. Nobody batted an eye when Kim Dokja sat beside Lee Gilyoung at the kitchen island. Yoo Sangah grinned warmly at him and passed him a plate of food as if he had spent every morning of the past three months in this exact spot. 

Han Sooyoung had promised they would wait for him. She did not break her promises.

Only Jung Heewon showed any sign that his presence was out of the norm, and it was in the subtle form of squeezing his arm as she passed by him to sit beside Lee Hyunsung at the kitchen table. She winked at him from across the room. Kim Dokja ran his fingers across the blue socks he kept in Yoo Joonghyuk’s sweatshirt pocket, grounding himself. His wedding band snagged on a loose thread. 

Kim Dokja paused, suddenly cold all over. He let the grief consume him for a moment. He thought about how cruel it was that Yoo Joonghyuk would never get to meet Jung Heewon and Lee Hyunsung’s child. He thought about how cruel it was that they’d never get to have a child of their own. He thought about how cruel life was, period. And then he thought about the Great War of Saints and Demons, of all things; he thought about how just as there could not be light without darkness, there could not be darkness without light. 

With a shaky breath, Kim Dokja pushed play. 

***

The grief stayed. Rather than diminishing, it was more like the grief remained just as prevalent, but life continued to grow around it. His world got bigger, not smaller. There were still days when Kim Dokja could not leave that room; where he was back on that subway train. But as time passed, the good days outnumbered the bad.

Slowly but surely. 

The children graduated high school. Kim Dokja was in the front row, camera poised. He helped them move into their respective dorms at Seoul University and then back to the villa when both children realized that being away from home was too difficult, even if they were only down the street. 

The bookstore officially opened. Kim Dokja spent most of his time there. He found that he enjoyed the work immensely. Novels had helped him through the darkest times of his life in the past; the present was no exception. Reading them, spreading them, living them – what difference did it make? Stories were stories. Yoo Mia decided to take a gap year before college, and she helped him run the place. He liked seeing little glimpses of Yoo Joonghyuk in her dark eyes, in her tentative smiles. 

Jung Heewon and Lee Hyunsung’s baby was born. He was healthy and beautiful and alive, and the first time Kim Dokja held him in the hospital room, he felt like he had been born again, too. He represented everything Kim Dokja had wanted for his companions when he decided to stay on that train: a happy tale that went on forever, for generations. More than that, though, he represented why Kim Dokja stayed off. He kept that disfigured pair of crotcheted blue socks on him at all times as a reminder of what Jung Heewon had told him that day. Life goes on, with or without him. 

He wanted it to be with him. It needed to be with him. 

Yoo Sangah and Han Sooyoung got married. Somehow, Kim Dokja got roped into being Han Sooyoung’s man of honor. As Kim Dokja watched the reception from the sidelines, he thought about the day he married Yoo Joonghyuk. It had been just the two of them, alone in a courthouse. When the others found out that they had gotten married behind their backs (“Hold the fuck on. Kim Dokja, is that a wedding ring on your finger, you asshole?”), they had thrown a small party for them in the villa's living room despite Yoo Joonghyuk’s adamant protests. It wasn’t a grand event such as this, with a fancy reception hall and formal attire and the best catering in Seoul, but it had been perfect nonetheless. 

When the reception ended, they visited Yoo Joonghyuk’s grave, still stressed in their suits and dresses. 

“Yoo Joonghyuk, you bastard,” Han Sooyoung said, fist pressed against the tombstone. Then, quietly, so only Kim Dokja, who stood beside her, could hear it, she added, “Thank you. We wouldn’t have made it here without you.” Then she poured a bottle of champagne over the dirt. 

Kim Dokja looked up at the stars and wondered if Yoo Joonghyuk could really hear her from somewhere out there. He hoped so. 

A few months later, the newlyweds announced over dinner that they would try for a baby. Their biological clocks were ticking, or something like that. 

“So if anyone wants to offer up some free sperm, be our guest because that shit is expensive,” Han Sooyoung crudely tacked on. 

It was a joke, but the words resonated in Kim Dokja’s mind. With them came a memory. A few weeks after they had gotten married, Yoo Joonghyuk, without looking away from the video game he was playing on the couch, had casually said, “I froze my sperm.” 

Kim Dokja choked on his cup of hot chocolate. “I’m sorry, what?” 

“I froze my sperm,” he repeated, deadpan. 

“No, I heard you. I definitely heard you. I meant – put that controller down!” Kim Dokja forcibly paused the game and threw the controller across the couch. “You can’t just say that you froze your sperm and continue to play your game, you idiot. When did you do that? Why did you do that?”

“The day after we got married,” Yoo Joonghyuk replied. His thumb traced over Kim Dokja's exposed ankles, stretched across his lap. “When I was searching for you, Biyoo helped. She looked like you. She sounded like you. And you said it yourself. You like being needed. And you love children.”

“So, you froze your sperm. I see.”

“You don’t have to use it,” Yoo Joonghyuk said, rolling his eyes affectionately. “But the option is there.” 

It was an option that Kim Dokja had never even considered. Now, though, as Kim Dokja babysat Heewon and Hyunsung’s son for their weekly date night, and as Han Sooyoung’s words continued to run through his mind, he thought about it. Hard. He had never considered it before because the thought of purposefully raising a child without two living parents seemed a bit selfish, a bit cruel. But what if the child had three? 

After a week of mulling it over, Kim Dokja suggested it to Han Sooyoung and Yoo Sangah, who exchanged looks with each other and then gaped at him. 

“You don’t have to say yes,” Kim Dokja quickly added. “But the option is there.” Sometimes, it was easier to borrow words from someone else in situations like these than to think of his own. 

“No, no, we’re going to say yes,” Han Sooyoung said. Then, she dramatically shuddered. “I am just slightly traumatized by the thought of Yoo Joonghyuk relieving himself in a hospital room. Do you think he used one of those shitty magazines? Or watched porn? Or maybe he read one of Uriel’s fanfictions that she wrote about you –”

Kim Dokja threw a couch pillow at her.  “Forget it. I changed my mind. I’d rather die than have a child with you.” 

It felt good to hear Han Sooyoung tease Yoo Joonghyuk, even in his absence. For a while, nobody dared mention his name in Kim Dokja’s presence, worried that it would send him into another spiral. But the more they talked about him, the easier it became. The less gone he felt. 

Nine months came and went. They named her Yoo Jieun, and she looked exactly like Yoo Joonghyuk. Kim Dokja stared at her for hours and hours and hours. Yoo Joonghyuk was gone, but the story they created together did not end. Not really. It never would. Kim Dokja’s ◼️◼️ was ‘Eternity’ and ‘Epilogue,’ after all.

Life went on. 

***

In another world, Kim Dokja bound through space and time. 

It had been a while since he went by the Oldest Dream – the 999th regressions did not like it when he referred to himself as such, and Secretive Plotter simply did not allow it. Nor did he allow the others to refer to him as the Plotter. 

“You are Kim Dokja,” Yoo Joonghyuk told him firmly. “And I am Yoo Joonghyuk. That nightmare is over.”

They lived in a worldline that had reached its end, where society had mostly been restored. Kim Dokja went to high school. He hung out with his friends – he had those now, miraculously. At home, the 999th companions doted on him. Yoo Joonghyuk did, too. For so long, Kim Dokja thought that happiness was something he could not find, no matter how many lifetimes he lived. He feared that happiness was the one dream he could not make reality. 

But he was wrong. He existed. He was real. And against all odds, he was happy.

When Yoo Joonghyuk returned to the forest to take care of matters that Kim Dokja did care to ask about, Kim Dokja often joined him. There was a room in the castle that projected footage from all the different worldlines, as well as screens depicting the deep, endless nothingness of space. This is where, years ago, Kim Dokja had seen the 1864th Yoo Joonghyuk being torn apart by the hounds and had frantically begged his Yoo Joonghyuk to save him. Yoo Joonghyuk rarely had the heart to tell him no. 

Kim Dokja sat in that room now, occasionally glancing at the screens as he completed his math homework at a circular table. And then, from his peripheral vision, he saw a light, too bright to be a star, appear in the vast abyss of space. Kim Dokja instantly recognized the dazzling orb. It was a lost soul. 

He was not allowed to leave the castle during these trips—the creatures of the abyss were too dangerous—but Kim Dokja was drawn to the robust and pulsating soul that shined brighter than any other he had ever seen. Despite the rules, Kim Dokja snuck out of the castle through a portal in an adjacent room when Yoo Joonghyuk was too distracted with his work to notice, an astronaut helmet securely fastened over his head. 

The soul lept into his hands when Kim Dokja reached out for it as if it had been waiting for Kim Dokja to come along and save it. The orb was warm and alive in his palms; it beat like a heart. In all his years as the Oldest Dream, in all the time since he had returned as Kim Dokja, he had yet to come across a soul that clung so desperately to life. He snuck back into the castle, the little soul vibrating wildly in his palms. 

“Why are you floating around out there?” Kim Dokja gently asked the orb. “Don’t you want to reincarnate? Do you need help?”

Suddenly, the soul became engulfed in white light and grew so hot that it instantly burned Kim Dokja’s hands. He hissed and nearly dropped the glowing ball. “Alright, alright! So, you don’t want to reincarnate, then? That’s why you’re still floating around out there?”

The light faded into something more buttery and warm as if to agree. Fond of the soul, for some reason, Kim Dokja stroked it comfortingly. And then, like a bolt of lightning to the chest, Kim Dokja lept to his feet, heart pounding frantically against his ribcage. 

He would know this soul blind, in any form, in any life, in any regression.

[The ‘Oldest Dream’s’ ◼️◼️ is ‘Yoo Joonghyuk.’] 

“Hyung! Help, hyung!” Kim Dokja shouted at the top of his lungs, cradling the orb protectively against his chest. 

Yoo Joonghyuk burst into the room and grabbed the boy by the shoulders, fear flashing in his dark eyes. “What? Why are you yelling like that? Are you hurt?” But besides the tears streaming down the boy’s face, he seemed unharmed. Yoo Joonghyuk wiped the boy’s tears away and waited for his panic to fade into something more manageable before speaking again. “Do not scream like that unless you are in danger, you little fool. What is wrong with you?”

Shakily, Kim Dokja held out his hands. The soul began to vibrate madly. 

Yoo Joonghyuk stared at the orb for a long, long time. Then, with a sigh, he took it from Kim Dokja and held it up at eye level. He glanced at the screens depicting thousands of different worldlines until he found the one he sought. The one that was different from the rest. The one that had Kim Dokja. 

Projected on the wall, he saw Kim Dokja sitting in a cemetery, a toddler with an uncomfortably familiar face tottering around in front of him. He was smiling as he talked to the companions that surrounded him, but there was an ancient sadness in his eyes that Yoo Joonghyuk knew all too well. Without thinking, he rested a hand on his Kim Dokja’s shoulder, and he held it tightly. He peered down at the boy, who was so different from the Demon King of Salvation but had somehow grown from the same roots. 

Kim Dokja was Kim Dokja. Yoo Joonghyuk was Yoo Joonghyuk. 

“1864,” Yoo Joonghyuk said to the orb, cold. “Are you really so weak? How many times must I save you?”

***

The door to the bookstore opened. 

“Welcome in,” Kim Dokja chimed, but he did not look up from his book. It was Han Sooyoung’s newest release, after all. There was no story he would rather read. 

Or so he thought. 

“Kim Dokja.” 

[Story, ‘Life and Death Companions,’ has started its storytelling once more.]