Work Text:
The air tastes of sulfur when he wakes, and deep in his bones, Tom feels a deep dread uncoil and hiss a warning.
He walks outside, shaking the sleep from his mind and limbs as quickly as he can. It's late afternoon. Everything is still there, as far as he can tell- his tree, his home, Wag and Tucker's drug van that still floats suspended in midair.
Nothing burns. The horns of Armageddon do not sound. Maybe, Tom thinks, half-giddily, it's all over already. Maybe he slept through the fucking apocalypse.
Maybe he's the last one left.
Just to be sure, he checks the server list and exhales in deep relief. No, he's not the last. Jordan's here, alongside Dianite and Tucker.
Still, something is deeply, horribly wrong. The air is too still. There is a portent of impending death on the horizon. The clouds barely move, like the whole world is fighting to breathe. Tom kicks off of the ground into the air and almost falls down again out of sheer shock.
The ocean is gone.
Not even drained. It's just fucking gone. The bed of the ocean remains, a horrible reminded of the gentle waves that once rested in their earthen cradle, but the water itself is gone. The bones of various sea creatures, some large, some less so, rest on the floor, bleached white and caught in snapshots of twisted agony. Tom races towards Dagrun, pausing every so often to gawk at the utter destruction below him.
The town is in no better shape. The ground is grey and everything is dry, shriveled. The place looks like a ghost city, utterly drained and devoid of all life.
Tom has to land to lean against a shriveled tree and catch his breath, panic catching in his chest and threatening to constrict his lungs. He shuts his eyes and forces himself to count to three, then five, then seven. He will not look at the arid landscape or the huge glass ball full of water that sits next to the town, presumably as a water supply. He will simply stand here and try his best to breathe.
"What the fuck?" he asks out loud to nobody in particular, voice shaking and broken. "What the actual fuck happened?"
The breeze staggers by limply, weakly ruffling Tom's hair. On his shoulder, a gentle touch rests, the most comfort the giver can give in their state. The gesture is nice, but for the love of the gods, Tom's entire body is shaking by now and it is nowhere near enough to calm him down.
"Good, you're up," says Dianite. "Almost thought you were dead for a moment there, boyo." They pause. "Well, you are, being a zombie and all, but that's not relevant."
Their voice is quieter than usual, either from exhaustion or a rare moment of gentleness or maybe both. Tom carefully leans into the touch on his shoulder, starting to hyperventilate a little, and invisible arms wrap around his back, offering as much stability as Dianite can give him in his spirit form. It still is not enough.
"It's over, isn't it?" Tom asks hollowly.
Dianite sighs. "Not yet," they say.
"It's going to be over soon, though," Tom says in a low voice, and it is not a question.
Dianite puts their other hand firmly on Tom's right shoulder, the touch flickering briefly for a moment. "My brother's agreed that we're going to try and revive me and my sister tomorrow," they say, tone almost apologetic, and Tom finally looks up to look at the space where their face should be although there is nothing there.
"Why is everything gone?" he demands, shaking himself loose from Dianite's gentle grip and gesturing out angrily towards where the ocean should be. "Where's the sea? How bad did we fuck up?"
"It's not us, boyo," says Dianite. "Bubbles of chaos have been erupting nearby and causing all of this. We're working overtime to just minimize the damage."
Tom exhales heavily, half in disbelief, half in rage, and he feels Dianite step forwards to stand next to him. It's all wrong. He can barely breathe. He just woke up and the world is ending tomorrow and he does not know if he should scream or cry, so he just clenches his fists until his knuckles are white.
"The others have been saving what's important to them," Dianite says quietly. "If you have any unfinished business to wrap up, now's your last chance to do that, boyo."
Their voice really is quieter than usual, and rough around the edges with pain and exhaustion. Tom just blinks and rubs his eyes in frustration. This should not be happening. It's not fucking fair.
"I'm sorry," says Dianite, even more softly, and those words sound so strange coming out of their mouth that it temporarily shocks Tom out of the numbness threatening to spread over his entire body and mind.
"You said it yourself, it's not your fault," he says in a clumsy attempt at comfort. He can't see Dianite, but he can imagine them nodding. He takes a breath and thumbs backwards. "I'm gonna go some things in order. If we're leaving tomorrow, then I got shit to do."
Dianite nods in understanding, his presence fading from the air beside him, and Tom wastes no time kicking off into midair and heading towards Jordan's reactor complex.
When he told Dianite that he had shit to do, he wasn't entirely lying. He did have one thing that he wanted to do before the world ended tomorrow.
There was no promise that the attempt at revival was going to go smoothly, nor that it was even going to work at all. To be quite frankly honest, Tom was fully expecting to be dead by this time tomorrow. It was now or never.
As he got closer to Jordan's complex, Tom's stomach twisted with anxiety, but he shoved the feeling down. He was done running from this. This was something he'd been wanting to do for a while now, but he'd never had the guts to do it.
If the world was going to end tomorrow, then nothing mattered anymore anyways. Statistically speaking, there was no better time to try this and fuck up horribly in the process.
He caught a glimpse of red and black at Jordan's witch hut and dropped to the ground awkwardly with a thud, heart already pounding.
Jordan looked up and turned around, obviously distracted by what he'd been doing. It took him a moment to register that it was Tom who was standing there, but when he did, he relaxed a little. "Hey Tom. Glad to see you're up."
"The world is ending tomorrow," said Tom urgently, anxiety rising to a crescendo as he stepped forwards.
Jordan blinked a little in shock at the look on his face, but nodded. "Yeah, it is," he said slowly. "Is there anything... do you need anything from me?"
Jordan didn't look like he'd slept since Tom had left. He'd grown out some stubble, his hair was matted, and the bags under his eyes were more pronounced than usual, which was really saying something considering that this was Jordan, after all. Still, Tom pushed all that aside and walked forwards another step, trying to ignore the feeling of his lungs constricting in his chest.
"Yes," he said as clearly as he could, then paused. "Well. Okay. Not entirely. I don't need something from you. I just kind of-" he took a breath and then exhaled, dropping his hands to his side- "I need to tell you something."
"Okay," said Jordan, raising an eyebrow. "Did you blow up my house?"
"No?" said Tom, taken aback by the answer. "No." He shook his head. "No, no, no. I'm being serious here, Jordan." He walked forwards another few steps until he was standing right in front of him, barely able to feel his legs. "I- um."
Jordan looked at him expectantly and Tom looked over to one side, exhaling shakily. Shit. Shit. He didn't have a plan for this. He was fucking everything up.
But this was his only chance.
"Yes?" asked Jordan suspiciously. Tom looked back towards him and inhaled again, stepping forwards. "Hey, whoa. What are you-"
Face burning, fire running through his veins, Tom leaned forwards and kissed Jordan on the lips for all of two seconds before breaking off roughly and stepping back again.
"That was it," he said, shoulders starting to shake. Jordan was staring at him in open shock now, but Tom didn't care about his reaction. He was too far in to back out now. "I just wanted to do that once," he said quietly, exhaling and looking down at the ground, face flushed red, "before the world ended and we all died."
It was silent in the little clearing. Somehow, this corner of the world remained untouched by the chaos that had ravaged Dagrun, the grass and trees still wearing the hearty green of midsummer. The breeze ruffled the leaves of the trees and the grass and wildflowers under Tom's feet.
In front of him, Jordan still stood frozen in shock. "I can go now if you want," said Tom. His voice broke as he looked up at Jordan again, chest burning with embarrassment and a small but persistent lick of hope. "I just- I've been wanting to do that since basically forever."
Jordan just gaped at him, mouth slightly open. He looked over to one side, fingers absently reaching up to brush his lips where Tom had kissed them, face turning red. That little hopeful flame in Tom's chest grew brighter and hotter, but he stepped back, something bittersweet settling on his tongue. He let it sit there.
The gods themselves only knew how badly he wanted to kiss Jordan again and how deeply, but he wasn't going to do that if he wasn't okay with it.
If he was going to die tomorrow, he could at least live with this one taste of Jordan's lips.
Jordan looked over at him again, face steadily getting redder and eyes glinting. He wore a strange, unreadable expression that Tom couldn't parse whatsoever. Was he mad? Confused? Both? Either way, he was getting nervous again.
That anxiety only increased as Jordan opened his mouth a little, shut it, and cocked his head to one side, eyes all but blazing now.
"Again, I can go if you want me to," said Tom quickly, stepping back again.
Jordan shook his head. "No," he said. "I was just going to- Tom. Tom."
"Yes?" asked Tom, trying his best to not hyperventilate.
Jordan sighed. "You call that a kiss?" he asked, one eyebrow raised.
The hope in Tom's chest roared to life again and he grinned, physically restraining himself from bouncing on his tiptoes. "Well, no," he said, trying his best to sound cocky but still coming off as a little hesitant. "but if you want a real kiss, then I can definitely give you that."
Jordan just stood there with his arms crossed and one eyebrow raised, a hint of a smile playing at his lips. Tom stepped forwards a little and he did not step back in return.
Taking a deep breath, Tom ran straight at Jordan and kissed him again, running into him with so much energy that he toppled backwards, taking Tom with him. Jordan landed flat on the grass, Tom falling on top of him with a grunt.
Jordan's breaths came short and shallow, the wind knocked out of him, but Tom got up a little bit on his hands and knees and kissed him again, harder this time, hands clutching the grass for dear life and his chest aching with the fire running through his veins.
He made himself pause just in case Jordan wanted to back out, but his fingers laced through the hair on the back of Tom's head, pushing his head down and kissing him back. Jordan breathed quietly but deeply, his tongue finding its way into Tom's mouth, and with his face burning Tom let his full weight settle on top of Jordan's body, one of his hands twining itself gently into his hair.
Never in his most hopeful fantasies had Tom ever imagined that this kiss would be this sweet, nor that Jordan would be this gentle with him despite the passion with which their lips met, taking quick, shallow breaths before hungrily going back for more.
Jordan's hand held firmly onto the short hair on the back of Tom's head, but the grip was gentle nonetheless with a tenderness to it that made Tom's heart ache. These very hands had pinned him down with a sword held to his neck plenty of times before, but now Jordan's body was like clay under Tom's hands, warm and strong but soft to the touch.
Carefully, Tom untucked the front of Jordan's shirt and slipped his hand underneath it, resting it on his waist with his thumb resting on his stomach and his palm following the curve of his side.
Jordan's entire body stiffened a little at the touch but then relaxed entirely, a low groan coming from deep in his chest. He breathed more deeply now, kissing Tom back with a slow, deliberate tenderness that made him melt.
With a deep exhale, Tom let his muscles fully relax, slowly moving his hand up Jordan's stomach to rest on his abdomen. Jordan gently scratched the back of his head, fingers working at his scalp, and Tom's breath hitched in his lungs with a sudden swell of emotion.
He'd kissed others before, of course. Tom was no stranger to the passions and intimacies of the flesh. But this was no quick, shallow hookup with mouths meeting greedily and hands taking what they wanted with no regards for the flesh they pulled at it. This was a tenderness so deep and so intimate that although Tom had never truly known someone like this before, his body somehow already knew the patterns of gentleness that made Jordan melt below him.
In Tom's chest had lived a beast of loneliness for a very long time. It awoke at the slightest touch and carried with it a yearning, desperate hunger for any and all closeness with anyone it could get its scaly hands on. At times, it reeled and writhed so strongly that Tom was sure that his heart was about to burst with the sheer force of it.
But here, kissing Jordan deep and slow, flesh pressed to holy flesh and muscles entirely relaxed, that beast ate its weight in gentleness and more until, sated, it curled back in on itself and slept peacefully for the first time in Tom's life.
That desperate yearning in his blood turned suddenly into something quieter, something softer, and with tears prickling in his eyes he came back up for air and hesitantly rested his forehead in the middle of Jordan's collarbone, releasing his fingers from his hair and moving his right hand to rest upon Jordan's shoulder.
"Are you alright?" asked Jordan quietly, worried. Somewhere above, a breeze stirred. The sun warmed Tom's neck, and he focused on keeping his breaths even. In. Out. In. Out.
Jordan's other hand found his free one and gently, carefully, intertwined its fingers with his. Jordan's palm was warm and rough with callouses and the creases in it rested gently against Tom's. He felt his breath hitch in a quiet sob.
"Yeah," Tom whispered, raising his head to stubbornly wipe the tears from his eyes. He shifted his weight so that more of it was resting on Jordan's chest and turned his face towards where their hands lay clasped.
Tom didn't give a fuck anymore about almost certainly dying tomorrow, and fuck the fact that the world was ending too. If he went right here in Jordan's arms with one of his hands resting on his shoulder, the sun heating up his back, and Jordan's heart beating below his, he'd make a heaven out of it. Gods knew he'd worked with far less in the past.
Tom was no stranger to gods and their machinations, nor was he oblivious to the trimmings and trappings of power and how it danced hand in hand with religion. He'd been both heretic and god in the same breath, and he'd slicked his hands with the blood of empires. He knew how these things worked down to the whirring of the individual gears in the machine.
But for all he knew, and indeed for all he cared, he had never known anything as holy as this.
"Are you sure?" murmured Jordan. His voice was low and rumbled in his chest. Tom could feel it in his cheek. "You're crying."
Tom blinked the tears out of his eyes once again. "Yeah," he said huskily, mostly responding just so that he could feel Jordan talk again. "I'm sure. I'm not crying because I'm sad."
For once, Tom wasn't even lying. Actually, this was the most relaxed he'd felt in probably forever. He shut his eyes and felt the sun on his back, felt Jordan's chest rising and falling below his cheek, heard an insect buzzing pleasantly nearby.
No, those tears were there because a years-old knot inside his chest was finally working itself loose and the catharsis was the sweetest thing he'd ever tasted.
"Alright," said Jordan with a small sigh. He carefully sat up with Tom still leaning against his chest and lifted him up a little so that Tom's chin was resting on Jordan's right shoulder and his arms were around Tom's back. "Just making sure."
At that, Tom finally let his guard down completely, clutching onto the back of his jacket for dear life and sobbing quietly into his shoulder as Jordan, concerned but gentle, held him there, one thumb rubbing comfortingly up and down his back.
For years now, Tom had been grasping at straws to keep himself going. He jumped from small joy to small joy, made them a part of himself in a desperate attempt to make his life more bearable for even a moment and called those moments peace. He was used to running on far too little, but that stubbornness had kept him alive so far so he made it his mantra.
This feeling put that fake façade he had foolishly called peace to shame.
For a moment, he was almost sorry that the world was ending tomorrow so that he couldn't spend more of his life here, at home in Jordan's arms.
At least he'd figured this out late rather than never. At least he'd figured this out at all.
Still, Tom had a thought that made him catch his breath and lean back. He was dead serious now. He was not going to hide behind a paper-thin veneer of reckless confidence, not this time.
Jordan was looking at him with no small amount of concern, which made sense considering that Tom was pretty sure he'd only seen him cry in front of him once before, and only then out of anger.
This was the first time Tom had let his guard down around him, and even now the close proximity made him tremble, but he stubbornly pushed aside the fear and took one of Jordan's hands in both of his, looking him dead seriously in the eye. Tom took a deep breath.
"It's alright if you don't like me back," he said quietly. "I get it. I just wanted you to know that I've been in love with you for years now." He looked down at the grass for a moment before continuing. Clouds drifted by above, and for this one moment, everything was alright. "The world's going to end soon, but if something goes horribly wrong and I die tomorrow, just know that it was all worth it because I told you that."
Jordan was silent. Tom didn't blame him. This was a lot to drop on someone. He had his mind made up now, though, and he had never been more sure of the words he was saying in his life.
"If you die tomorrow for whatever reason," Tom said, "I'll do my fucking best to avenge you 'till my last breath, okay? That's a promise. I know Dianite's my god and all that and I'm showing up for their revival, but if anything happens to you, I'll make sure it's not in vain."
Tom looked back up at Jordan to see him looking at him with wide eyes. He winced a little internally, but it didn't matter. Even if Jordan didn't believe him, he'd stick to his word anyways.
(Tom had never done anything like that before, but it felt right. This felt right.)
"You're being serious right now, right?" asked Jordan slowly, leaning back a little.
"Jordan," said Tom, not letting go of his hand, "I have never been more serious about anything in my entire life."
Jordan opened his mouth a little in response to that, then closed it again. He put his other hand on top of Tom's.
"I trust you," Jordan said quietly. Tom felt a small shiver run down his back. They both knew how much those words meant, coming from him. "And I-" Jordan paused and looked over to one side, fumbling for words.
"It's okay," said Tom. "This is a lot."
"No, it's not that," said Jordan, shaking his head in mild frustration, presumably at himself. "I'm just not great at words."
"You're alright," said Tom. "Take your time."
"Okay," said Jordan, half to himself.
It was quiet for a little while after that. Jordan sat looking off to one side with his head resting in one of his hands, thinking. Tom picked at the grass and hummed a little to himself. Through it all, they kept at least one of their hands clasped with the other.
"I think I've got it now," said Jordan eventually, sitting up. Tom nodded encouragingly and he sighed.
"I don't think I love you like you love me," Jordan said quietly. "We both know that I don't really do the whole romance thing."
Tom nodded. "Yeah, figures," he said. "That's not a problem for me, though. If you want to do something about this, that's alright by me. If you don't, that's also fine."
"Yeah," said Jordan, half-absently. "I'll have to think about it. But that doesn't mean that there's not anything there at all." He paused again, searching for the right words to use. "It's less of a feeling and more of a fact of life, if that makes sense."
Tom nodded, a little confused, and Jordan smiled at him a little. "Yeah. It's weird, but it's like- okay, we all know how I get about my Lady sometimes, right?"
"We do," said Tom. Memories came to him- Jordan kneeling before an altar in the end, Jordan defending a goddess that nobody else even knew existed yet, Jordan with his single-minded devotion that got him in and out of trouble quicker than you could blink.
"Yeah," said Jordan. "I kind of get that with- for you as well. It's not one to one. It's a little bit different. It's kind of like if- it- well-" He broke off with a frustrated sigh before going quiet for a second or two. Tom waited patiently.
"You're like the sun," Jordan eventually said quietly.
Suddenly, all that Tom had felt over the past hour seemed insignificant.
"Oh," he said softly. "I get it now."
Jordan smiled at him then, a huge grin that was also a little sheepish, and in the sheer radiance of that light Tom felt the temperature in the clearing go up another few degrees.
I want to spend the rest of my life with you, he wanted to say, but he didn't because all the signs pointed towards his life ending tomorrow and in the face of that reality, that sentence meant nothing.
I wish I had told you all this earlier, he wanted to say, but I was scared of everything back then and too much of a coward to be genuine, I'm sorry, but he didn't because all that was in the past now, wasn't it? You can't change what's already been done.
"I love you," he said, and Jordan smiled at him again, softer this time but no less genuine.
"I love you too, man," said Jordan. "And hey, don't worry about tomorrow. We'll figure something out. We always do."
"What if one of us dies?" asked Tom. "What will we do then?"
Jordan was silent for a moment at that. "I don't know," he admitted quietly. "That'd suck balls. But we'll cross that bridge when we get to it, yeah?" He let go of Tom's hand and patted it reassuringly. "We'll be alright."
Tom exhaled. "Yeah," he said. "Thanks."
"No problem," said Jordan, getting to his feet. He extended a hand to help Tom up as well. "Need some help packing up?"
"Uh, no, not really," said Tom, checking his pockets just in case. "I don't really have anything that isn't on me right now that I want to carry to the place we're going to, wherever the hell that even is."
Jordan snorted at that, and Tom knew the moment was gone. He almost missed it already, but he still felt lighter for having had the conversation anyways. And the way Jordan looked at him, he knew he hadn't hallucinated the entire thing.
"Well," Tom said briskly, "good talk."
"Yep," said Jordan with a nod. "It sure was."
"Does this mean I get to call you 'babe' now?"
"Only if you pay me twenty diamonds."
"Wait, is this a one-time thing, or do I have to pay you twenty diamonds every time?"
"It's a one time payment."
"I," declared Tom, pulling out his wallet, "can deal with that, babe."