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Jimin and Jungkook should have expected zombies at their front door. It was a very probable possibility. After a calm that lasted longer than all the rest in their recent past, it only made sense.
It didn’t matter how they made their way to the warehouse—their warehouse—without their notice; they just needed to last.
“Hyung!” Jungkook yelled frantically, lifting his bat, ready to swing at the group of zombies that had tackled Jimin to the ground. He sprinted ahead, having just gotten rid of his own personal mob untouched.
He heard the cock of a handgun and then the fire of a bullet. Jungkook watched, with his weapon still wound up behind him, as gore spurted from the hole that punctured the zombie’s head. It promptly fell, leaving three more hovered over him.
“Jungkook-ah?!” came a strained cry.
Jungkook’s heart flooded with fear. Jimin definitely sounded like he needed help.
He rushed forward to the closest zombie in a desperate burst of speed. He angled his swing at his side and followed through, whacking one’s head off cleanly.
From the ground, Jimin managed to get another shot into one on his right. It crumpled to the ground with a grunt.
Jungkook lunged and swung underhandedly, decapitating the last. The sound of metal hitting skin and bone broke into the air louder than the other had, signifying the end of another successful battle.
What remained were the sounds of Jimin and Jungkook panting, energy drained as staying alive did every day.
Jungkook dropped the bat somewhere behind him and bent down to Jimin’s side. He held his hand out, ready to help him up, but blood drained from his face when he noticed the fresh crimson stain on his right shoulder and the accompanying ragged tear in his shirt.
“Hyung…” he started in a low voice.
Jimin didn’t look at him. He was silent and expressionless as his hand flew to his shoulder to cover the hole.
Without taking Jungkook’s hand, he stood up and faced away to gaze out at their property, at fields of dirt and dark forests that surrounded the warehouse. Their only safe spot. Their sanctuary.
The silence was loud in Jungkook’s ears. He didn’t hear himself step across the warehouse pavement toward the doting boyfriend who had kept them alive in this hell.
“Hyung,” Jungkook spoke up again, his voice thinning with fear. He was watching Jimin, but he did not move anymore than he already did; afraid of the reality, afraid that his assumptions might be right. Afraid that his worst nightmare had come true.
Finally, perhaps with some acceptance of his own, Jimin parted his lips.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered. He looked straight into Jungkook’s eyes, completely devastated. “Jungkook-ah. I’m so, so sorry.”
A bite.
Jungkook’s heart shattered coldly at his feet.
Jimin approached cautiously. Jungkook stared blankly at nothing for a few moments. He was frighteningly still, as if time could catch the hint and stand still with him.
Would that buy me a little more time with him?
Jimin reached up to brush the bangs out of his eyes. Sweet, protective Jimin, with a warm touch that soothed every nerve that tensed Jungkook’s body.
As soon as Jungkook felt him, he lost it. His heart wrenched out a sob. He didn’t try to control any of it; he allowed the ugliness of his pain to show on his face as he dug his face into Jimin’s cheek.
“No, hyung, no, no,” Jungkook begged, tears streaming down his face. He grasped distraught fistfuls of his jacket, as if at any moment, someone could physically take the boy he loved. “God, no.”
“Jungkook,” Jimin said in an even voice. “You know what you have to do. Just like we practiced.”
The fastest and cleanest way to kill a zombie—a straight shot through the head.
Dread shot up Jungkook’s spine and wrung the life out of his soul. So quickly, everything crashed painfully around him, unable to be stopped or rewound.
“Hyung, I can’t. I can’t, I can’t, I—”
You are all I have left.
“Jungkook, you’ll have to,” Jimin interrupted. He bit his lip hard enough to draw blood. Even now, he tried his hardest to keep himself together. “It’ll only be a couple hours before I turn.”
“Then we can wait until—”
“No,” he barked. “That’s not what I want—you know this. I don’t want to die as one of them. I want to die as me. If you can’t do it… I’ll have to do it myself. Whether you’re with me or not.”
Jungkook stared at him in the eye—at his bravery, his anguish, his love for him. He could never let Jimin do it alone.
But he could barely breathe.
Not Jimin. Please, please please not my Jimin. Why whywhywh— “Why?” he choked out. His hands, in shaking frantics, gripped Jimin’s shirt tighter in his fists. He could rip the fabric off if he tried. “Hyung, you can’t leave me. You’re not allowed—you aren’t—please. I can’t live without you!”
Jimin’s face crumpled at his words. God, Jungkook was selfish, wasn’t he? He didn’t even think about how Jimin was feeling. All of this was incredibly hard for him, too.
“I’m so sorry, Jungkookie!” he cried, cupping his love’s face.
Jungkook embraced him and quickly sought his lips with his own. Please don’t take him away. Pleasepleaseplease. He kissed his mouth, cheeks, every part of his face with all the passion within him as if he had to prove his love and his need for him to someone judging him from above.
Jimin had to stay. Jimin had to stay.
“Jungkook-ah,” Jimin breathed thickly, his lips pressed against the corner of Jungkook’s mouth. “Let’s go to the docks.”
Jungkook swallowed. Jimin loved the sea almost as much as he loved him. The docks behind their safe house provided a splendid view of it.
Our sea. Our sanctuary.
“I want to see the sunset before I go.”
Jungkook closed his eyes for composure, even though his eyes continued to burn with tears.
“Let’s go,” he agreed, his voice no more than a wisp.
The sun was just beginning to lower when they stepped onto the docks. It was rather peaceful, with only the sounds of gentle currents below and around them. Jungkook heard no birds nor zombies. It was like everyone and everything knew.
Jungkook held Jimin’s hand tightly as the elder moved to the end of the dock. He gazed at the sun, the waters he will have to leave behind, and let out a soft, tremulous sigh.
“Hyung,” Jungkook called. He pulled Jimin away from the sunset to face him.
Jimin looked at him expectantly.
But Jungkook had nothing to follow up with. He would just rather be the last thing Jimin ever saw.
Jimin’s hand was clammy. It was just hours before, prior to the wave of zombies, when he felt the opposite—warm and reassuring.
“You’re my golden star, Jungkook. You have to survive.”
The finality of his words immediately blurred Jungkook’s vision again. Salt was all he could taste.
“Without you?” he mouthed, feeling so weak that he could barely stand there.
“You’ll always have me,” Jimin whispered, and leaned in to kiss him once more. They drank in the taste of each other, memorizing the softness and adoration. Their last.
Jungkook wrapped his arms around him, and held him as if his life depended on it.
“I l-love you,” he stuttered through a quivering chin.
“I know,” Jimin said. Jungkook felt his smile against his neck, even as his tears wet his face; this precious face Jungkook had kissed and nuzzled against so many times. A face he thought he could hold in his palms forever. “I love you, too, Jungkook. Always.”
With that, Jimin ruefully pushed him away.
It was time, and they both knew it. But Jimin might as well have ripped his life apart with each move he made; with every adjustment he made until his heels were right at the edge of the dock.
No matter how brave the dongsaeng had to pretend to be, he still let out a helpless cry at his arms’ emptiness and the cool metal of the gun his hyung set in his hands. Jungkook was barely able to grip it because he was shaking so hard.
“Close your eyes, sweetheart.”
Jungkook blinked several times to clear his sight. He took one last, long, eyeful of Jimin; the love of his life, his partner in combat, his sole companion in this entire mess. He was beautiful against the sunset, the oranges and reds filtering his eyes, face, and hair like he was some angel of dusk.
“It’s okay,” Jimin encouraged him. The lightness in his tone gave no indication of what they were about to do, but his smile was so tearful, so wrought with sorrow that Jungkook’s limbs felt like jelly just from looking at him.
“We’ll do this this together, Jungkook-ah. Okay?”
My golden star, Jungkook thought, mentally engraving the way Jimin had said it last.
Didn’t Jimin know that he was his, too? He was his sun. He was everything.
“Close your eyes.”
This time Jungkook complied, swallowing the lump in his throat. He felt Jimin’s clammy, calloused hands force Jungkook to hold the gun up to the elder’s forehead. With his thumb on one hand, he pulled back the hammer. Jimin’s other thumb brushed over Jungkook’s index finger; where the trigger was.
“Hyung?”
“What is it, sweetheart?”
“I’ll never stop loving you.”
“I’m glad.” His voice was a barely controllable whisper. “I’m glad, my Jungkookie. I love you so, so much.”
Jimin pressed his thumb in.
The gunshot burst into the silent evening, bouncing off the wall of the safe house.
Jungkook heard a splash in front of him, final and gentle. That didn’t echo against the docks or the warehouse, but it rang within everything left inside of him.
Biting his lip so forcefully that he drew blood, he let the gun drop pathetically from his hand. He turned, only opening his eyes when he was facing the opposite direction. At their—his—warehouse.
Who was going to hold him up now?
Jiminnie-hyung, his heart cried.
Even with despair crushing him from every angle, he forced himself forward.
Forward, forward, forward.
Repeating it was the only way he could bring himself to the door. He shouldn’t stay outside at night; Jimin would get mad at him. He would huff out a sigh and worriedly scold him, and then he would hug and kiss him, glad that he was safe and sound; glad that he hadn’t been scratched or bitten—
Jungkook collapsed to the ground instead of opening the door. He had lost all the strength to move and to hold everything in.
So he screamed.
None of this made sense to him; none of it was fair. There was no justice in Jimin’s death or in any of what they had gone through together.
Jungkook punched the warehouse door, the concrete, and then the brick walls. None of it took away the pain. Neither the blood on his knuckles nor the tears running down his face washed out the longing that will never be fulfilled.
With the last of his energy, he heaved himself onto his back to stare at the sky.
The cicadas from the forest sang with the coming of night, but it still felt empty. The stars twinkling down at him like millions of sorry eyes only made him feel worse.
Close your eyes.
He shut his eyes, adhering to the voice in his head. Jimin’s voice. The exhaustion from combat and loss washed over him like a cold, heavy tidal wave, but he gladly blocked out the hell around him.
For Jimin, he must survive.
Another sob broke through him.
Even if he had to live for his sake, it didn’t mean he couldn’t mourn.
Because it will never stop hurting.
Any lifetime, he prayed; to someone, something, anything.
Give me any lifetime, any way, where we can be together forever. Please. Please.
Unbeknownst to him, a star shot across the sky.
Jungkook’s eyes fluttered opened to the smell of grass and the feeling of cloth against his face. His skin was a little sweaty from the warmth of summer, making his shirt stick to him as he rolled onto his back.
“Ah,” he cried softly, squinting his eyes. He lifted his hand quickly to shield the blindingly bright sun peeking through the tree leaves above him.
What? The last time he checked, it was night… wasn’t it?
A flash of dimly lit, silent sea docks and an even darker warehouse fleeted across his memory—only to disappear, erased as quickly as it came.
Suddenly, a face slid into Jungkook’s view, blocking out the sky.
Jimin.
The boy hovering over him giggled. “You were in a pretty deep sleep. Didn’t get enough last night, huh?”
“Jimin… Jiminnie-hyung?” he asked dumbly.
“Aw, my Jungkookie’s still out of it.” Jimin leaned down to briefly kiss his nose. “No schedule today, remember? Just rel—”
His words faltered when Jungkook’s hands reached up to cup his cheeks.
“You’re here,” he whispered in an urgent tone.
The smile on Jimin’s face faded a bit to accommodate concern. “Of course, my golden star. Why wouldn’t I be?”
The nickname stirred his heart with memories and experiences he never had.
A dream, he told himself, though somehow, distantly, it meant more than that.
Jungkook pulled Jimin’s face closer. His hyung lost his balance and collapsed on top of him.
The maknae kissed him deeply. He was brimming with feelings of sad longing, but he didn’t know what he missed—Jimin had always been here.
Jimin sighed softly into his mouth, but broke away a few seconds later. “Jungkook-ah, we shouldn’t do that here,” he murmured as he lifted himself off him.
Jungkook had completely forgotten that they were sitting under a tree on a grassy field at a park near the hotel. In public, basically.
“Oh, right.” He blushed.
Jimin brushed Jungkook’s bangs out of his eyes. “Are you okay? Did you have a bad dream?”
“It was… pretty crazy,” he answered, his tone soft with thought. “But it ended badly.”
“How?”
“You were gone.” He wanted to say more, like how Jimin left him, but he was already struggling to remember. “I could never see you again.”
“Good thing it was just a dream, then.”
Jungkook could practically taste tears and blood as he licked his lips; tears of heartbreak, lip-bitten blood. So far away, but so tangible. “It was like I was living in another lifetime.”
“It felt that real?” Jimin smirked. “Well, in this lifetime, you’re stuck with me.”
Give me any lifetime, his mind suddenly added—were they words he had said before? The familiarity vanished when he tried to think about it, but it didn’t seem that important, anyway. Not with Jimin here.
“Yeah,” Jungkook told him with confidence. “Stuck with you.” He rolled over so that he could rest his head in Jimin’s lap like a pillow and slid his arms comfortably around him.
Jimin stroked his hair. “All is good, then?”
Faded. Just like that, all the imagery disappeared completely, like many of the ones he had before. Just a dream.
“Everything is great, actually,” Jungkook breathed, smiling with a new-found appreciation for life and the boy he loved.
“Great, huh? I’m glad.”
Jungkook snuggled some more into Jimin and listened contentedly as he broke out into a soft song.
In this lifetime, this reality, it was more than great.
Everything was perfect.