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Blood splatters onto his face once more, once again, red-thick, warm and fresh, carmine on pale skin like the contrast of droplets of blood against the ivory snow. Luka stands perfectly still, the motion of warmth seeping around him, enveloping him whole, as a gentle embrace.
The feeling of being hugged feels so unfamiliar.
“I resented you so,” Hyuna says, as he inhales, exhales, inhales, exhales the oh-so-sweet smell of petrichor from her, awfully, painful nostalgic from a decade ago, before the accident happened, before the new competition started, before the stage fell. “I had to keep moving forward in every moment.”
He feels something wet slide down his cheeks, once, twice, then thrice, as he feels her grasp tighten on him.
“Please,” He mouths, yet is unable to allow any singular word escape through his throat, the bane of his life, the pride of the aliens, the result of decade upon decade of practice coming into the moment as all but useless within this moment. “Please-”
His vision wavers and the stupidity of his soul turns to flashbacks from a universe parallel to his present, glimmering and saccharine. The darkness speckles at his vision, and it feels like the warm grasp turns to something that discovers his whole body and consciousness into a different mortal realm-
𝄞
“Hey, you’re seriously daydreaming right now?”
Luka blinks, before white blinds his vision, and in a natural reaction, he squeezes his eyes shut, head pulsating at the forefront.
This is his world, but also isn’t.
Counting to one, two, three, he flutters his eyes softly and is met with the flickers of nightlife, blue, green and red speckles of technology found within skyscrapers below him, below his penthouse, simply bustling, simply alive. The walls are all windows where he lives, and when he focuses his eyesight closer to him, he recognises Hyuna in his arms, frowning slightly.
Oh. Oh.
He’s-
The easiest way to describe the feeling that courses through Luka slowly, dancing through his veins and travelling softly through his heartbeat when he comes to consciousness, is that something is- off. Missing, even.
It's so incredibly off-putting, like one shift to left, one degree too tilted. He’s lived his whole life in the internal webs of cities his entire life, yet he feels like he hasn’t. He’s been spoiled rich by his adoptive parents his entire life, yet he feels like he hasn’t. He’s ready to start his modelling career, yet he feels like he hasn’t.
He’s dancing in his already paid-for penthouse with the girl he’s loved at first glance who he met at a shitty cheap bar his parents would disapprove of, drinking one too many bottles of wine with her, yet it feels-
As if he’s forgetting something.
“Oi, Luka-! Don’t tell me you’re already falling asleep.” She groans, throwing an arm onto his shoulder, and hugging him. “You’re such a lightweight.”
“I’m not a lightweight,” He says automatically before the newfound confusion can be processed fully into this universe, through the throes of his mind. “You just drink too much.”
Hyuna giggles, humming something unintelligible, low and sultry, and something ticks in the back of his spine at her melody captivating through his ears, like one of a siren's call.
She’s so, so incredibly beautiful.
Just what is wrong? What is missing?
Hyuna huffs, and then steps away from their embrace, before intertwining both of their hands together. “C’mon, let’s dance,” She grins, and slowly, he tunes in the background music of Elvis Presley’s song ‘Can't Help Falling in Love’ from the 1960s playing through one of his many speakers, and even more notices that she’s swaying to the melody, an invitation.
The song begins to start.
(Wise men say,)
His heart beats, and thrums quickly, something hot in his face, and he nods, beginning to sway, and dance, too. “Don’t you always say you have two left feet?” He asks, raising an eyebrow.
She steps forward, grasping his arm. He steps backward, taking the other hand.
(Only fools rush in…)
She mirrors the same face, beginning to step in rhythm to their sways, their movements. “And don’t you say that you’ll always have a tragic asthma attack if you keep up with what I’m doing?”
(But I can't help,)
Luka stares at her. Hyuna stares at him. Luka leans in closer to her ear, grinning. “Are you sure we should be doing this?”
(Falling in love with you…)
He watches her face go slightly pink at the edges and smiles even further when she tries to hide it, disguising it at the tipsiness of alcohol.
(Shall I stay? Would it be a sin,)
In rhythm, Hyuna extends out, and steps back once, twice, the clack of her heels resounding against the floor, dark blue dress pillowing down into velvety fabrics. “Of course, we should! I dressed up for this, after all.”
Hyuna spins in front of him. Displays and seamlessly demands his full, unbridled attention, crinkled eyes with the soul of earth brown, peering through his personality, his mind, his voice and his fake self that was built upon money and fame. Tearing it down oh so easily, bringing out who he truly was.
(If I can't help falling in love with you?)
He has to remind himself to breathe, as he pushes his glasses back up again, to view, to perceive Hyuna.
And she’s stunning, for it. Strands of hair falling in perfect waves and lines, intersecting. She’s beautiful. She’s pretty every time he’s seen her. She’s pretty every second to minute to hour to day to week to month to year that he’s seen her. Pretty through every moment, up or down.
(Like a river flows, surely to the sea…)
“You’re as beautiful as the day I met you.” He says it as a complete truth, so real to his soul and logic within his mind that it could be a prayer, a law, of sorts.
She all but nods in response, before leaning back in beat, grabbing a bottle in her hand and placing it into his hand, perfectly in sync, easily. He stares down at the bottle- his hand on top of hers, slightly, long and pale in contrasting comparison, yet both matching rings that he had bought for both of them, blue the colour of the ocean, the sky, the constellations embedded were on their fingers; the middle for Hyuna, the ring for Luka.
(Darling, so it goes, some things…are meant to be…)
“More alcohol?” He muses, playfully. “Tomorrow morning will be fun.”
Hyuna shrugs, swaying. “One more bottle for both of us won’t hurt.”
“That’s what addicts say.” He says, stepping backward, stepping forward, stepping left, stepping right, her hands feeling so loving, caring.
(Take my hand, take my whole life, too,)
Hyuna barks out a huff. “You’re calling me an addict? Listen. I don’t find alcohol, alcohol finds me. ”
He can't help but snort, pursing his lips.
“...Seriously?” He looks at her with something of disbelief. Hyuna grins back with a full set of teeth.
(For I can't help falling in love with you…)
Did he ever mention that they had met in a shitty bar? Did he ever mention that his lover might be slightly obsessed with alcohol? Did he ever mention he was most definitely not a lightweight? Did he ever mention how beautiful she was, and how lucky he truly was?
(Like a river flows, surely to the sea…)
“That look is cute, sweetheart,” And just like that, she’s dancing the dominant role in the dance now, oh-so suddenly swept off balance, only held up by Hyuna’s arm around him. “Keep looking like that, and I’ll have to wipe it away.”
(Darling, so it goes, some things…are meant to be…)
His heart does a few too many jumps in rapid succession.
Time doesn’t exist, as they dance, alone in the penthouse, as if they are the only souls within the universe that exist, as if nothing in the stars matters, as if they are the same of the soul; reunited and so complete. (Take my hand, take my whole life, too,) They’re not perfect as they dance, tripping and occasionally stumbling over one another drunk, and they’re anything but good, for Hyuna truly does have two left feet and Luka’s bad stamina causes them to dance at a pace two beats slower than the song, yet it doesn’t matter when they’re laughing over trivial matters and stupid ideas from the past, and though something still feels so, incredibly wrong, he can’t seem to mind, in the moment.
(For I can't help falling in love with you…)
Hours pass by like seconds.
(For I can't help falling in love with you…)
His lips touch upon hers, at some point, and maybe the wine bottle has gotten them far too drunk, for Hyuna slips, and the uncorked bottle splashes hues of something mixed crimson and merlot purple onto the two of them, and Hyuna bursts out laughing, hugging him as the bottle falls and spills to the ground. Luka yelps- yelps, of all things, unable to stumble back because of the grasp she has on him, and he can feel it, feel the wine sink through the whites of his clothes and onto his button-up, sticky and stained as if it's-
𝄞
Blood stains the whites of his clothes. Luka doesn’t even need to look down to know that there’s red from her stomach bleeding through her bandages and onto him, the liquid wedged tightly between the two of them, like a link, a reconnection, an olive branch reached out by Hyuna in some form of attempt.
He thinks he’s heaving, right now. He thinks he should be used to this, by now, after all the experiments, all the deaths, all the songs and controls and screams, yet-
He glances at her, just for a millisecond, as if still in disbelief she was here, that she was alive. Hyuna breathes harshly, every shallow wheeze sending shocks of stabbing pain through his heart, his lungs, his mind, and he’s once more reminded second after second that she had just been shot because of him, him, him-!
He screams, and nothing spills from his mouth but gasps of air.
Luka instantly yanks his eyesight back in front of him, hazed and blurry, the sin of greed, the sin of regret bearing down on him, dauntingly, horrifyingly. Flashes of murmured whispers and bright lights, cheers of aliens from sickening entertainment all remain but an afterthought to him, on the stage, on the planet, when Hyuna is here, like always.
“...But you were always my one and only weakness,” She whispers truthfully, so gently as if the past had never occurred, as if they were still in Anakt Garden, playing within the artificial grass, pointing at the fake skies to tell stories about one another, perceived from their mind. “That’s why I resented you so.”
Weakness, weakness, weakness, the words pool in his mind, repeating, looping, for he didn’t think that Hyuna could have anything called a weakness, and if anything was to be a weakness to her, it would be the leg that was caused within the accident that they both witnessed, two sides of the same coin, survivors of the past. Though the word weakness was said within the same sentence as Luka himself, and he thought he was having yet another one of those dreams, overbearingly sweet to the point of sickness, the feeling of Hyuna breathing was too realistic, too alive.
Why do I have to be your weakness, Hyuna? Why couldn’t you keep hating me after what sins I had committed?
The lights are too bright and the screams ring in his head too much and all he can focus on is the inhale, exhale, inhale of Hyuna’s chest rising and falling in sync with his own, every thump of heartbeat causing more and more blood to rush out, seeping-
𝄞
The rays of curious brown eyes born with the richness of the earth meet his own as he opens his eyes, again.
Hyuna is so warm, in his embrace. They’re on the floor, covered in wine, one too many bottles in, limbs strayed over each other, tangled up. Casual and anything but formal, rustled and messy. The lights have been turned off, their faces only illuminated by the constant consciousness of the city's shining lights.
The feelings of something being off finally click, making sense.
They’ve always been there, for him, somewhere hidden at the back of his mind. Since birth, since childhood, since teenagehood, since meeting her. Always, always. The tepid numbness makes sense to him, now.
Stinging, pulsating.
This is not his universe. This is all but a figment of his imagination, his mind.
Through the darkness, the empty box of pizza on the floor and the hum of the fridge across the room, he sees Hyuna smiling, as if she knows.
“You figured it out, huh?” Hyuna says, whispering, understanding, one of the same souls, moving a hand over his face, stroking the strands of hair that fall over his eyes, only blocked by the rim of his glasses. He doesn’t know everything he wants to say, but his soul speaks truthfully, and instead, he nods.
All at once he feels so madly, clumsily, stupidly and horrifyingly in love with her; almost to a point of desperation, almost to a point of foreshadowed trepidation that came true. The feeling bursting at the seams, thumping over and over again, an itch in blue fingers to create, compose more universes, more realities to etch his love into the skies, into the galaxies and pools of stars, blending and shading vibrantly in the rocks and books of history.
“...I just wanted to wish, to dream, Hyuna,” He replies. “In another universe maybe we could’ve been something- something like this.”
He gestures to the air, the atmosphere, the room, the world that is not of his own.
Hyuna caresses him. “And I’m sorry we couldn’t be something in this one.”
Luka smiles and feels something so alive in his soul at the words.
“Thank you for everything.”
𝄞
“Luka,” Hyuna grits, with so much emotion, a passion that was thought to be whispered away with age, long, long ago. “...live with love.”
He hiccups, sniffles, and her grip on him tightens even further.
“Embrace the pain, the frailty, and the moments so unbearably shameful. Forgive yourself…again and again, endlessly.”
Born. Killed. Anakt Garden. Experiments. Carving into skin. Tied up, chained up. Paraded and shown off. Treated like pets. Captured and beaten. Surrounded by blood and guts. Human experimentation. Perfection. Hospital. Breathing masks. Pale skin. Ragged breathing. Heart palpitations. Death on a rock. Crushed on the stage. A winner with the cost of everything, everyone he could’ve loved.
“Because everything…begins from there.”
Luka breathes. Hyuna breathes. The tears pour down his eyes. He whispers something of a desperate plea.
Luka breathes. Hyuna breathes. Hyuna laughs, softly, under her breath. Luka bites his mouth until he tastes something metallic hit his tongue.
Luka breathes. Hyuna breathes. The grasp loosens on Luka. His ears become muffled and the screams and cheers of the aliens mould and weave into the cheerful shouts of his childhood youth.
Luka breathes. Hyuna breathes. Hyuna leans her head onto Luka, and it feels so horribly limp; as if she’s giving up. Luka feels the bloodstain bleed a different kind of warmth onto his clothes, his skin.
Luka breathes. Hyuna breathes. Hyuna falters in her stance. Luka and her prosthetic leg are the only things keeping her standing.
Luka breathes. Hyuna breathes. Luka sees everything but nothing.
Luka breathes. Hyuna breathes. Luka feels her slump. Something sickening stirs in his stomach.
Hyuna breathes.
Luka breathes.
Luka breathes. He doesn’t hear her move.
Luka breathes. He doesn’t hear her voice.
Luka breathes. He doesn’t hear her breathe.
Luka breathes.
Luka breathes.
Hyuna falls in his hands so incredibly, silently, still. Her chest doesn’t move, doesn't wheeze, doesn't grasp the fabrics of his shirt and soul knowingly, understandingly. There’s blood on his face. There’s two lost, miscommunicated lovers on a stage.
“Hyuna,” He responds, softly. “ I have always loved you, too. ”
And Hyuna doesn’t respond, for death has taken her.