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Chaos. Screams. The world as they know it is falling apart. The world they have been fighting for, been risking their lives, have gathered scars like badges and stickers. Some visible to the world, some locked within their hearts, their quiet. Holding them within their palms pressed against their chest; tiny stitches covered, but pain still burning at their skin, pin-pricks of needles with every move they make.
It made them stronger. Made them grow inseparable as a team.
It made them vulnerable with carefully placed blows, chipping away at the walls they’ve built around themselves like old paint.
Keith forces his eyes shut, eyelashes fluttering like the hummingbird caught in his chest. Panic. Faster, faster, ragged. Out of control. Claws scratching at his throat, every breath a painful stab in his chest—Shiro’s body pressed against his own, both heaven and hell. A wish that had been an arms length out of reach; was supposed to stay like that.
He had been fine with it. He never wanted it like this. Never wanted to hold Shiro close, with blood seeping underneath their suits marked in scratches and burns. Sticky against aching skin and bones.
Keith wraps his arms around Shiro’s waist, tighter, tighter, until he’s choking on ash and words left to be said. The words he wants to scream stuck in his throat, a throbbing ache in his chest. There’s air in his body where it shouldn’t be.
He holds on tighter, because that’s the only thing he can do to keep his knees from shaking, the splashes of blood and the dying screams of his teammates—his friends—still as vivid in his mind as the strong hands cupping his head from the back of his neck.
Shiro slumps a little, then. Knees buckling with eyes long closed, they sink to the ground as each other’s anchor. Hold each other close, hiding from the world, their small moment of peace around destruction. He counts until three, ignores the throbbing ache at his back too close to the heart. A wound barely scraping the fine thread of his life. Fragile. A wound he earned to protect the man in his arms, just so close to shaking, from breaking.
Shiro sighs. Lets his head fall forward until he meets Keith’s. Dirtied and sweaty. Focuses on the stuttering breath closer than ever, the way it fans across his skin, smeared in ash and blood.
How many times had he imagined, this? Keith holding him close, all fire and instinct. Burning skin against his. His own hands lost in the dark strands of Keith’s awful haircut he had always been too stubborn to change.
In another universe, this might have been real. Without the impending death, without destruction marching closer like a metronome set to 120 beats per minute. (Tick, tick, tick, tick—crash; scream.)
Maybe in another universe, they could hold each other without the world they fought for crumbling. Without Shiro’s eyes stinging and burning and stubborn to stay strong.
“Keith—” He says it like he’s calling for help, and maybe he is. Maybe he wants to be able to open his eyes and not only see darkness and disaster. Maybe he wants to press Keith even closer to himself, to warm the cold wind hissing at his back, stabs at flesh like ice and fire.
And to ease the pain they share, Keith silences him with the desperate press of his lips. He holds his breath, memorises the warmth. How alive Shiro is against him. The drumbeat of his heart, the curl of human and artificial fingers in his hair, the stuttering fire against his skin. How they press against each other as if they’re drowning, inhaling nothing but dust and water. Drowning together, within each other. Finding peace, at last.
The world is falling apart, but it’s quiet. Like folding blankets together at the beginning of summer, gliding your hand across the fuzzy surface before storing it away. For when winter comes.
It’s quiet like the tears rolling down Keith’s cheeks; quiet like Shiro wiping them away with his human thumb. Quiet like a shooting star, lighting up the sky and dying as fast as it formed.
Except that this is to last.
Shiro smiles against trembling lips, and whispers a set of words only for Keith to hear. Whispers them like a promise, seashells swept away back into the sea for their next adventure.
The world is falling apart, but they aren’t.
And in another universe, they might get their happy ending.