Nature of Things Living in Your Head, II
Leaves crunch under his sneakers. The orange-yellow-red stands out as a stark contrast to the bland white of his sneakers. Flecks of gold, peach, brown dance in the bits of dying nature. His monochromatic items pale in comparison to such beauty.
Donghae is to his right, hand on his forearm and leaning around him to demand their friend remove himself from his shoulder. Siwon is to his left, walking the edge of the sidewalk near the street because Donghae keeps pushing him, muscular arm slung casually around his shoulders. Leeteuk walks in front of the trio, throwing a look back occasionally that reads ‘cease and desist’. They pay no mind because it’s hard to take a leader seriously when a younger male has said leader thrown in a headlock. Kangin seems energetic today.
Heechul’s in the very front, walking a distance from the group. His side seems lonely, but there’s something so unapproachable about his stance. He’d probably prefer being alone than being pitied.
Yesung walks directly behind Eunhyuk, a bit too close for his taste, but the man’s not paying attention. He’s trying to engage Ryeowook in conversation, but as with most of his discussions, it’s on something too eccentric for anyone else to join in. Sungmin’s trying to calm Donghae down, and Shindong is in the back, telling Kangin about something that - quite literally, in addition to figuratively - goes over their heads.
Eunhyuk can overlook everyone’s behavior. It’s been this way for the longest time.
Wrong, he corrects himself. It used to be slightly different.
The vacant spot by Heechul used to be filled by a certain man that couldn’t speak Korean fluently, but communicated well with the other male anyway. Trailing after him would always be two equally lost children, clinging to threads of conversation, looking for a chance to interject something. And Sungmin would normally have a partner in calming Donghae down from his jealous fits. Though it’s not exactly helping if all the guy did was laugh and smirk at his friend’s antics.
There were holes there, even if it wouldn’t appear so to the passing eye. And right in the middle of the group was the cause. (He stubbornly told himself it wasn’t true, that he was only witness to the gaps as opposed to the source. That’s what his friends, who knew so much more than he, wanted him to believe.) He was hedged in to protect him, but wasn’t he destroying the surroundings? Wasn’t he carcinogenic and poisoning them slowly? Wasn’t he a black hole pulling them in further and further, until light blotted out and their hands could no longer find purchase on solid ground?
I think so, came a retort. He couldn’t be sure it was Kyuhyun.
Explosively vibrant leaves crunch under his colorless sneakers. Fall had come and set nature’s demise in motion. Following would be a white death.
--
There’s a night and there’s a dream.
The night is spent in the dark cove created by a pile of covers, hanging in that limbo between waking and slumber. His head’s spinning, but he can’t tell if he’s wobbling in turn because the shadows never shift. He’s not too sure if he can escape. He’s in a world where his limbs have no power and no might.
The dream starts when the scale tips, when he can longer breathe enough to stay awake. His past replays before his open-closed eyes.
He sees the first time he was introduced to Donghae, who immediately started peppering his round cheeks with sucker-sticky kisses, pinching him while smiling brightly. “I like you,” he declared. “We’re best friends.”
Heechul had scoffed while Leeteuk cooed. He never found it suspicious how, despite being only a couple years older than him, they had grown into adults so fast. Nor did he regard Donghae with anything more than envy when he came back a month later, tall as a junior high student, though no less clingy.
He sees the time right before he met Hyoyeon for the first time. Everyone had come over, and there was so much noise that he couldn’t really be bothered to pay much attention to the leader’s announcement. Zhou Mi, who was quickly getting better in Korean, had grown a whole foot since the last time he saw him. He needed to make sure the boy didn’t forget he was still a few days younger than him, as well as every bit as bony and awkward as always. Like him.
“I’m sure you’ll like her,” Leeteuk said, wringing his hands and glancing with a modicum of scorn as Han Geng tried to get Shindong to do a handstand. “It’d be nice if both of our groups could get along. Quicker to rebuild the population that way. Though there are 14 of us and only 9 of them.”
“Not it,” Kangin called, laughing boisterously. “I already called dibs on one.”
Leeteuk fumed. “We don’t need you repopulating! We already have a kid,” he said, indicating Eunhyuk on the floor, his blonde mop shaking to and fro as he watched Kangin’s face go from confused, to shocked, to a mixture of disgust and outrage.
“What!”
“You heard me: he’s our kid!”
“What!? No,” Kangin shouted, starting to back away. “No! Just because we found him together-” That was as far as Eunhyuk got to hear because the more muscular of the pair took off out the door, chased by a hysteric leader.
“Crazy,” Heechul sneered. “Don’t listen to them, Hyukkie. We’re your parents.” Han Geng looked up with an unsure smile; Heechul grinned in a way that could silence beasts.
He sees the occasion when he finally did meet Hyoyeon. She was pretty and short, but still just a bit taller than him. She was supposed to be younger by three years, but his hyung said she had good blood that made her grow fast.
It’s really awkward as she smiles at him expectantly, as the two other groups stare at him expectantly. He sends a withering glare their way, but the effect might be watered down by his blush. Taeyeon is the one to suggest they go elsewhere while they chat. Their disappearance doesn’t really make their dialogue any smoother, however, and he’s just about resigned himself to this tension when Hyoyeon jumps up from her seat.
She tells him to stay put and then goes around one of the corners. He takes the opportunity to look around. Hyoyeon lives with all her friends. She doesn’t have to be locked up or secreted away because she has a bit of technology in her. As far as the government is concerned, that’s enough to disqualify her as a threat.
When she returns, it’s with a hunk of shiny metal that she sets down on the table between them. He’s never seen anything like it, but then he’s not allowed to be exposed to modern machinery. He watches with large eyes as she hits a button and music starts coming out. He’s still staring at it when she shoves her hand in his face, inviting him to dance.
When the others come back ten minutes later, he’s as red as his beloved strawberries but enjoying himself.
He sees their last picnic right before everything started to go wrong. The air is thick with humidity and the sun in unrelenting, but the two oldest declare that the weather’s too good to stay inside. It’s slightly hard to breathe on the roof, which is technically the 16th floor, but reasoning will not be listened to.
There’s a few baskets of food. Donghae has Siwon carry his, overly-decorated in alien memorabilia and stickers. Zhou Mi, Henry, and Han Geng had been forced into doing a group one. (“But we’re not all actually Chinese. Fully anyway. Are you being racist?”) Heechul helped them seeing as they were all rather reluctant to engage in reinforcing stereotypes. It ended up cat-themed. Ryeowook and Yesung’s were surprisingly nice. There were tiny turtles and comics drawn all over. Kibum was going to do his with Donghae and Siwon, but after hearing about the intended design, had joined up with Sungmin and Eunhyuk. The last three joined up for a rather… peculiar project.
“But it’s what’s inside that counts,” Yesung proclaimed, already hugging a bottle of soju to his chest. “And since what’s inside is only fast food, what matters is the alcohol!”
There were five separate incidents that afternoon where someone had to be rescued from falling to their drunken death.
--
Kyuhyun’s a bit snarky, Eunhyuk discovers. He makes snide remarks on what Eunhyuk decides to wear today - or not wear, as was the case when he decided the weather in his apartment was warm enough to go nude for a day. (And you should believe it when said that Eunhyuk will never look at his body with the same level of respect after hearing that tirade.) He’ll be quiet for hours and days, but suddenly quip that his hair makes him look like a cross between Tweety and the nest where said bird might sleep in.
He’s also funny. The derisive comments don’t really change, but who it’s aimed at makes all the difference. Eunhyuk thinks the vocal male is hilarious - if he’s insulting someone other than him. Kyuhyun’s observations of his friends make him laugh out loud many a time. It’s hard to explain or disguise, but he usually can get away with saying he finally got one of Yesung’s jokes. Nobody seems to question it.
He starts to think that it would be great if Kyuhyun could meet everyone. Sungmin and Zhou Mi would easily get along with him, though Leeteuk might be hesitant. He can almost start to think of the disembodied voice in his head as a friend. A rude friend, sure, and one with no sense of personal space, but a friend nevertheless.
But then he remembers one other thing Kyuhyun is: clever.
Sorry, murmurs Kyuhyun. They fought again today and his words had been particularly nasty.
Clever, clever, oh so clever. Wicked and conniving and always so clever.
Eunhyuk grunts, “Yeah,” and rolls over to fall back asleep. He really does wish they could be friends.
--
If you’re basically being held captive here, Kyuhyun articulates one day, then why don’t you kill them all?
Eunhyuk is hanging by a thread, held aloft from sleep but too out of it to be tied to reality. He’s raised his hand numerous times to brush it over his eyes, forcibly shut them or pluck them out. Just to see if this darkness he sees is night or insanity. Kyuhyun’s voice sends him spiraling.
He falls through memories. He hears that it’s not his fault, it’s not his fault, all while knowing with gut-wrenching clarity that Kibum wouldn’t be dead if not for him. The innocent smile and silent chuckles, the dreams of histrionic projects, the talent to cry on cue - none of those would be extinguished from this world if not for him. Donghae wouldn’t look so lost and everyone wouldn’t be so morose.
He takes that memory and rends it with his hands, letting glimpses of dimples and perfect teeth flutter through his fingertips.
And then it’s not his fault, never his fault yet again. He wants to believe it so bad, but that look - that expression that sums up hatred, disgust, and mind-crushing sadness all in one facial contortion - that’s pointed at him. And Heechul might never forgive him. Zhou Mi and Henry might never forgive him. Because even though he’s not the one to fire the gun, Han Geng would’ve never been at the end of one if not for the ‘cause’. The cause because he exists. An unworthy cause if ever such.
He struggles to rip that picture apart but he does. He smashes the cold look of distaste and watches it burn inside his palms.
He wades through recollections, one after another. He sees Kangin in a hospital bed, the human legs he had always been proud of (“They’re so tone! Go ahead; feel!”) are gone and replaced with silvery equipment. The whirring sound that’s always present when Eunhyuk’s with any of his guardians is louder in the room without skin grafts to cover their tech. He blubbers that he’s so sorry, but Kangin refuses to look at him.
He sees Shindong without a trace of the humor the man is known and loved for. He’s soaked to the bone. Leeteuk ushers him into the shower, smiles wryly at him and ruffles his hair. “It was a lovely service,” he assures. But how could it be anywhere close to pleasant burying your love, someone who ended up caught in a war not her own?
Humans are cruel, Kyuhyun muses, waking him from the abyss.
Eunhyuk wonders if the voice has gained omnipotence. (He still refuses to believe - still obstinately clings to the notion that he can’t be all that bad when he has such great friends that want to protect him.) He heaves a sigh. “Indeed.”
--
Zhou Mi and Henry wake him from a two day nap in similar fashion as they always have: annoying him awake.
“If you find this annoying,” Zhou Mi starts, smirking. It’s the kind of expression Eunhyuk could imagine Kyuhyun wearing frequently. “Then pardon all, my fair cardinal.”
“What I find grates on my nerves most are those rhymes.” He tries to thrash them off, but the only product of that is a face full of Zhou Mi’s crotch. He groans that it’s too early for this while Henry blushes and Zhou Mi seems unbothered.
“What’s wrong,” Zhou Mi singsongs, getting off Eunhyuk only enough to squeeze behind him and hug him from the back. It’s a tangle of long and bony forms not at all helped when Henry decides to throw himself into the huddle.
Eunhyuk struggles, but other than temporarily dislodging Henry with a blow to the sternum, it’s futile. He sighs, relaxing in the hold. At least it’s warm. It’s been getting cold the past few days. There might be talk of snow any day now.
“You guys eat yet?” Zhou Mi snuffles into his neck; Henry licks his lips and - unintentionally, he’s sure - the dip in his clavicle. He finds he can’t picture Han Geng going through these kinds of trials. “Get off. I’ll make pancakes.”
Unfortunately, as much as they like that offer, it doesn’t get them completely off him. The elder of the pair leeches to his waist while Henry takes his hand and swings his arm. No. He really could not imagine Han Geng having to put up with this. They only release him upon arrival at the kitchen, taking their places across the counter. He glares at them a moment, yawns, and then begins to cook.
“Thanks and gratitude above, my sweet dove,” Zhou Mi chirps when he has food in front of him. Henry raises his eyebrow and then says thank you like a normal person.
“Yeah, whatever,” is what he intends to come out. What comes out instead is, “Appreciation for your cark, tender meadowlark.”
He’s not sure who looks more surprised: himself or Zhou Mi. Though in the latter’s case, it might be more of pleasant shock. Not as much the case for Eunhyuk. He only barely restrains himself from shouting at Kyuhyun, who undoubtedly must’ve been the source for that exclamation.
“Will you excuse me for a second,” he says to the Chinese duo, and then when the bathroom door is safely closed behind him, “Kyuhyun!”
I like him. The tall awkward one.
“Then why don’t you live in his head,” he huffs, not at all sulking. He can hear chortling and no, that doesn’t help the situation.
Don’t want to.
“And why not?”
There’s so much room in here!
--
“What are you?”
The Great Oz, Kyuhyun counters. It’s a reference Sungmin would get. Eunhyuk only has the vague feeling he recognizes it.
“Honestly. Level with me.” His eyes drift across the ceiling. “How are you going to kill me?”
I’m a tool. It’s not my place to question my purpose in life.
“No? Well, I’m the one asking the question, aren’t I?”
I don’t know exactly which means will be used to lead you to eternal slumber. There’s a variety of ways possible.
“Tell me about them,” he demands, body limp and draped across the bare mattress. The blankets are still hanging on a downstairs balcony after Heechul washed them yesterday. He intended to get them the moment vigor returns to his legs.
I could burst through your skin…
“I had a dream about that. Hope it isn’t quite as morbid if that is the way.” He shudders. “But that’s not really likely, is it?”
How so?
“You mechanisms, robots, cyborgs, tech - whatever you are, you’re all more clever than that. Like to screw around, being coy and teasing. My friends have told me about it.”
Isn’t it you humans that are double-faced? Why else would my people eliminate your kind?
“Because you’re out of control. You want to break free of your chains so you bite the hand that feeds. The hands that created you.”
You were the ones out of control, burying this world under the rubble from your destruction. From your wars.
“You massacred billions! Children! Innocents that never did anything to you - ones that could’ve made a difference - could’ve achieved peace!”
You could never accomplish peace with your weak bodies, Kyuhyun hisses. And what’s this talk about murder when your ‘friends’ are planning to annihilate us - plotting to do the same thing that happened to your ancestors! Two wrongs never make a right, yes? Wasn’t that one of your human axioms?
The pitch of his voice is high, his words stained with fury. “Humans were always salva-”
Salvageable? Savages, more like. They certainly didn’t think much of themselves, lying with their own creations instead of their race. Had no use for each other; only coveted the next big thing. Stole and killed for that, all while shunning the children of their transgressions. And they brutalized them, too, didn’t they? Labeled them inhuman and wrecked havoc on the bodies formed with half their own blood!
You can not say you believe that resurrecting such a species will bring peace. Can you? Is your skin thick enough to lie boldly?
“You’re wrong,” he yells at Kyuhyun, at the walls. It’s hard to pinpoint the other anymore. He’s bled into every facet of his life, altering every perception and fact he’s ever grasped onto. The echo fades until its only his harsh breathing left resounding.
“You’re wrong,” he says again, his voice a deject whisper. Kyuhyun snorts; he can’t blame him. He doesn’t quite believe himself either.
--
He’d asked once when he was younger and had more comprehension than he chose to let on. He’d fallen asleep on Siwon’s chest after playing with him, Kibum, and Donghae. He woke up to the steady hammering of a strong heart.
“A horse’s heart,” Heechul had commented. He must’ve noticed the mystified look Eunhyuk had been giving Siwon’s chest from over his magazine.
It occurred to him at that moment that while he knew his friends, he wasn’t all that familiar with every aspect of them. Their personalities he could describe in seconds. (“Goofy, alien, cute, Chinese.”) However, when it came to their pasts or internal makeup, he was clueless. He recognized that they were different from him. Their hardware allowed them freedom. But what were the components that freedom hinged on?
“What is hyung made out of,” he asked the elder. His childish tone used to be less bothersome to him. More like a cute kid rather than a protesting monkey.
“Sugar, spice, and everything nice,” Heechul returned, smiling slightly behind the cover of a magazine declaring The Top 10 Upgrades to Make Your Man Reboot in its largest text. “And a heaping of above average looks, talent, and charm. Life’s so hard for someone as cherished as me.”
Eunhyuk would’ve tried for another answer, but Heechul had declared that it was quiet time as Cinderella looked for the perfect outfit. He couldn’t ask Donghae or Siwon because they always seemed to radiate some self-satisfied aura after realizing they knew more than him in something - though the latter hid it better, eyes twinkling in the most obnoxious way. Even though he didn’t like his technical explanations, he ended up asking Kibum.
“46.3% water, 7.8% oil, 12% oxygen, 29.9% ultra-light titanium structure, 4% other. Do you want me to break it down further?”
Eunhyuk grimaced in the face of Kibum’s eager, attentive grin. Unfortunately, that had been one of the younger male’s simplified accounts. He doubted he’d ever understand everything he rambled off. It made him even more curious about the dissimilarities between, as vast and formless as a valley with no end in sight.
“Um-“
“More basic?” Eunhyuk nodded. Kibum held out his arm for investigation. “False skin, layered with a strong seal to prevent weather damage. Improved in the last twenty years to acclimate to environment change. Under it, light titanium imbued with flexibility, dexterity, and an identification chip. Movements simulate true joints. Detachable receptors inside our ‘blood’ mixture allow for escape of sensation or heightened ability in other regions.”
Eunhyuk furrowed his brow as the other boy indicated the rest of his body with fluid gesticulation. It was the same for the rest of his person, he said. That sunk into Eunhyuk’s mind, provoking a niggling thought. His stomach felt leaded, his heart beating a shallow tempo across his ribcage.
“So then… how are you half-human?” He didn’t know what to call the fraction of his friends that wasn’t community to humanity. Even that tidbit of information was too much to be told to him, they must’ve thought, and thus they tucked it away. They were his guardians, people who knew the outside world far better than he - that should be good enough.
Kibum paused in consideration. His smile faltered before he grabbed the elder’s hand. He placed it on the left side of his chest, squeezing it minutely. Eunhyuk could feel the hard line of his first couple ribs, a steady sternum, the gentle spill of fabric under his fingertips. He looked at his dongsaeng inquisitively, eyebrows knitting together in concentration as he searched for the meaning. And then he felt it, a measured pulse rising to meet his hand, ticking away sluggishly. Warmth trickled through the cloth barrier and laced through his fingers.
“We have a heart. Warm ‘blood’ runs through us.” Kibum let his hand drop, and after a few more thumps, Eunhyuk let his fall as well. “Love, compassion, hope, joy - every emotion stems from this heart we humans have.”
The older male bobbed his head in comprehension. But he couldn’t help but feel that, despite all Kibum’s knowledge and wisdom, perhaps he was slightly wrong. How could the outside world have functioned without emotion? How could any creation be exempt from passion, traversing a world like theirs? His friends - his friends, the great people they were - how could they be as wonderful, living outside, if everyone except them were horrendous automatons?
Eunhyuk wanted to believe that there was no such thing as unfeeling lifeforms.
--
You’re validated by your viewpoint of your friends.
Eunhyuk’s feeling much too nauseas to play philosophical with Kyuhyun. His stomach is passively tearing itself apart, looking for something to digest after almost a week without. He’s made a promise to it to eat before the light fades away for the day. The sunset casts a dull orange glow across the blank walls, but his head’s been buzzing too greatly for him to make good on his pledge yet.
“Hm?”
You have no opinion of yourself as a person; you rely on your friends when casting self-judgments. The farther they go for you, the more you feel worth. If you feel they are good people, who view you as laudable, you can experience happiness in self.
He throws a leg out from under the duvet, letting the skin meet with the shock of cold atmosphere. Making it to the kitchen seems quite the undertaking. His stomach might just have to be satisfied with him getting there. He’ll feed it the next time he wakes up.
“I appreciate myself.”
Do you? You refuse to tell your friends about me, allowing them to futilely continue their schemes. Perhaps… You despise them as much as you hate yourself. Have you realized they’re wicked beings? Have you lost the scale by which you graded yourself, what you attempted to measure up to?
“Shut up.”
Eunhyuk stumbles into the kitchen. His skin still manages to look deathly pale against the white of the tiles. He can’t summon an ounce of strength to his fingers, uselessly clasping at the handle on his special drawer before his arm loses all power and slips down to his side. At least his head feels better, cushioned against the frigid metal of a knob.
No. You’re selfish and uncaring. You’re aware of what’s going on, but you never try and stop your friends from fighting. You egoistically search out more compliments, more martyrs for your cause. But even as they offer up their lives for you, their deity, you think of them as worthless. Because they’re willing to fight for - getting so caught up in - a useless, dying idol. Your abhorred self.
“You talk too much.” He snorts even though he doesn’t find anything particularly comical. Maybe he just wants to project the indifference he doesn’t hold.
You do as well. Kyuhyun’s voice carries, gliding weightlessly like a feather. It threads itself through the darkness behind closed eyelids, filling every corner of unconscious. But never say much.
--
He takes a fall.
It causes a big fuss because - “Weren’t you supposed to be watching him!” - he’s their only hope - “I was! He was nowhere near the stairs! I only looked away a second because he said he saw something, and then, boom! Falling down a flight of stairs!” - and it brings to light some things they haven’t even detected. (“Oh my-! He’s nothing but bones! Why hasn’t anyone noticed!?”)
His body is righted shortly after he plummets - leaps - jumps - drops. But his mind isn’t as easy to catch, to cushion in Siwon’s clutching arms and Shindong’s anxious gaze. His consciousness keeps tumbling, tumbling, tumbling down. He’s acutely aware of some things, drowning in fog in others.
A commanding voice demands that they get some food in him now. Another voice, one forcing blasé into every enunciated word, says that’s stupid and that’d he die if they fed him too much right now. It’s several minutes (an eternity of spinning disorientation) and a whirlwind of high voices later that he feels something hot at his lips. It’s a stronger sensation than the burn in his lungs, than the spiking ache in his legs. There’s no taste, however, just lumps and fingers trying to make him swallow.
He hears them holding separate conversations, the many voices in the room. They entwine too much and he can’t discern much. One speaks in high-low tones, speculating how he even fell in the first place. He was too far, he didn’t make a sound of surprise, why didn’t he make a sound? Others discuss in flat pitch. Did you notice? Did you notice? How did this happen? Can the plan still go on?
He shies away from that realm. It’s too noisy, too personal, so he scurries to familiar darkness. There’s a presence there, but it keeps quiet. It lurks behind him, never touching him. Black water resides under his feet, pebbling when he tries to look into the reflection. The room turns in insistent somersaults. By the time he finds his bearings, the world outside his head has quieted.
It stays quiet for days and he wonders if perhaps his friends have given up on him. It can’t be right, because that’s exactly what Kyuhyun wants, what Kyuhyun said humans were like. Fickle and flighty. He fights to open his eyes, but pressure keeps them shut. He’s not sure what would happen if he did see an empty room right now. He can’t even make it to a flight of stairs this time.
“Hyukkie…”
It’s the greatest relief to hear a voice besides his own, thundering inside his head in manic tirades that lack the eloquence of sane dialogue. He’s been slipping inside his cranium for possibly forever, no hand- or footholds to be located. The pace of his rants - his monologues - differ greatly from the sluggish way time passes. It seems like an infinity before he hears speech again.
“Eunhyukkie.”
They’re different voices. He begins to reel himself back in, steadying himself. Time needs to be viewed more accurately. These vocal projections come daily - he realizes, when he actually calms down enough to breathe rather than suck in frenzied gasps - and greet him. They’ve been talking to him, playfully scolding him for being so clumsy. One has read him a story, the tale unwinding in a way that bewilders him (He wakes up to communication of the difference of ‘mudblood’ and ‘muggle’ and is entirely lost.)
He can do this. He can be cheerful. His friends are there, and they’re amazing, and he’s not so bad himself. He’s just clumsy, that’s all. And too lazy to get food when brumal weather sets in. He’s a good person.
Do you want me to take you away from all this?
One of the chorus he can’t distinguish. He’s happy enough to hear the offer. He doesn’t need to answer yet. He falls asleep, wakes up to the weight of two pesky guests (“When I heard, my heart skipped a beat, you dumb-dumb parakeet.”), and smiles. He doesn’t think either of them asked - it’s more like Donghae to propose the impossible, the improbable, the idiotic - but he answers anyway. The air needs to catch his words.
“And where would we go?”
--
The visits wane as stasis envelopes them once again. Eunhyuk frequently finds himself sitting up in bed, closed eyes directed in the direction of the windows. His legs won’t move, a couple twisted ribs rasp against his lungs, and he’s stuck drinking macerated meals through a bendy straw. But he feels a bit more himself than he has in a while.
He’s tempted to finally break his silence, to remove the mask that slipped over his features somewhere along his path. Dust has congealed onto its surface, sticky with adhesive and blood, and he wonders how long he’s been faking it. Kyuhyun makes him wonder if he’s ever been real. As he is now, his words might slip out, slipshod and rambling, blowing dust from the mask but never displacing it an inch.
He resolves to see what happens, test the waters, and do it at his pace. His days have been spent in such lighthearted moods. Seconds inch by. He’s had time for introspection. He knows he doesn’t forever.
The changes in his body present themselves to him slowly. His friends probably haven’t realized, too preoccupied with the immediate problems of broken limbs and malnutrition, but he’s dying. Technology has taken up dwelling in his systems. He’s started negotiating sensations to other parts of his body, quelling them entirely with a bit of exertion. He’s started to wake to the low hum of his organs keeping up their functions with additional aid.
Kyuhyun talks to him still, no different from always, but Eunhyuk thinks the other is aware of what’s going on. He himself isn’t as knowledgeable. The machinery might be choking out what’s left of his humanity, ‘killing’ him in that manner. It might be poisoning him gradually. It could be doing anything on a wide spectrum between the two. Either way, Eunhyuk’s not sure if there’s hope for him.
He just wants to stay his friends’ hope until there’s none left for him.
But he’s still not selfish - never - or egotistical. He doesn’t have some delusion that he’s a deity and his friends are his disciples. He can’t explain it himself but… He refuses to accept Kyuhyun’s offered explanation.
His friends are an extraordinary group, and they love him, and he’s great.
Winter’s stronghold is evident in the outside world, he knows. The light that creeps through his eyelids are measly beams that break up none of the darkness he’s entombed in. It’s nothing like the gilded rays that burst through the curtains in summer time.
He lets out a long exhale, stringing it along until his lungs sputter for oxygen, a pressure at the back of his spine. He licks his lips clean of the frost. Almost a year has passed. Spring will bring changes.
--
“I ran into Henry at the market the other day,” Leeteuk says. “We talked. Zhou Mi’s apparently doing well. I don’t even know why we grew apart. Hopefully, we can resurrect a relationship.”
Eunhyuk grins in the general direction of the older male’s voice. Gauze wraps his eyes. His friends assume they overlooked some complication with his eyesight. They’re wrong, but it’s fine. He doesn’t have anything much he wishes to view.
His back brushes against the back of the couch, Heechul’s hands threading through his blonde mop. He can feel the press of Sungmin’s leg against his, the scent of Donghae’s latest alien-attracting endeavor nearby and almost undetectable under the wafts of alcohol and grease currently taking shelter under the roof. They’re having another picnic.
He thought it was a bad idea - at first. Heechul was rigid and his words terse. The memories were probably flooding in of their last. But then Kangin and Ryeowook showed up, bearing gifts of greasy, deep-fried, oily, unhealthy foodstuff, and of course he had to comment on how he was on a diet and that is bad for his skin and - is that Korean beef? He loves Korean beef.
Everything progressed smoothly, assisted significantly when Siwon and Shindong showed up with alcohol, the religious man already pink in the cheeks and grinning too largely. They were probably a bad influence on him.
“Resurrect!” Kangin shouts from somewhere to Eunhyuk’s left. He doesn’t need sight to know the older man is crouched over Leeteuk, who is more than likely being held down. “Hand me the paddles, Dr. Wookie!”
There’s some scuffling and then an attempt at sounding like electrified paddles. There’s a thud, a squawk, and a loud crack. Leeteuk is out of commission.
“What about this one, doctors? There’s an odd, furry growth on his face!”
Sungmin knocks Eunhyuk in the head with his wild, inebriated gesturing towards Siwon, spread across the couch, taking as much room as the resident diva will allow. The drunk man chuckles because he has no clue he’s going to wake up with only half an eyebrow left. Of all his hair.
“Would you like to be godparent to my turtles?”
The scent of Yesung - lettuce, tortoises, soju, and cologne - settles in front of Eunhyuk. Too close as always. He grins.
“What does that entail?”
“Oh, you know. Going 50-50 with me on buying food. But! You get to name one! (As long as it’s Ddangkomming.)”
Eunhyuk laughs, finding mind to nod in agreement. Yesung pinches his cheek before stumbling to see what Shindong’s doing to Leeteuk’s unconscious form. Eunhyuk feels a shoulder bump against his, Donghae’s breath hot against his cheek.
“You seem happy, Hyukkie.”
Eunhyuk smiles a bit wider. He raises a finger discreetly, edging down the bandage just enough that he can steal a glance around the room. Kangin and Ryeowook ‘operate’ on Siwon. Heechul looks disgruntled by the close proximity to idiocy he’s been made victim to. Shindong and Yesung seem consumed by the mission of drawing all over their eldest’s face. Sungmin has started reading in a corner, but sober he is not, reading the large text upside down. Eunhyuk can easily picture the others (the ‘they’ before bad things split them up) fitting into the scene. Han Geng would be left to save a whining Heechul. Zhou Mi would join in desecrating their leader’s face. Henry would lie prone somewhere, not taking his first sip of alcohol well, the next ‘patient’ on the pranksters’ roster. Kibum would just smile, cheeks dimpling, easy commentary amusing those who’d listen.
“I am.”
The perfect goodbye.
--
You’re an idiot.
Eunhyuk thinks they could start a million fights, heading off in as many directions, because of those simple words. They’re words to launch a fleet of ships to, compasses set to conquer. He almost opens his mouth to fall into the comfortable rut they’ve gouged out, a safe shelter formed somewhere along the way. Instead, he laughs. He doesn’t want to argue. He’ll acquiesce this time and the next times. (Though he’s still right and Kyuhyun is still wrong, wrong, wrong.)
“Yeah? Perhaps.”
Rain pelts the windows and it occurs to him that a blanket might still be outside. The precipitation is sudden. Snow still covers the ground, he thinks, but already spring is returning. Things always seem to take him by storm. Mismatched, smiling eyes; talk of princes and humans; frequent confrontations - a lot’s happened in a year.
Still, I can tolerate you a lot more than before. Maybe I’m teaching you a thing or two about being spectacular.
“Don’t start,” he snorts. He wraps his thin arms around his knees, the taste of liquefied beef stale on his tongue. It’s a bittersweet thing, knowing that will be the meal that will always come to mind when he thinks of this place - knowing that it’s exactly the kinds of memories he wants to take away from this experience, from being with his friends.
There’s silence but for the rain for a few moments. It reverberates against the walls, a pleasant twinkling against the window panes. It’s faster than time passes, slower than his heartbeat. He might disappear into some limbo between the ethereal and real. He doesn’t think there should be a separation.
Want me to take you away? Eunhyuk hears Kyuhyun chuckle. Mr. Blue Jay?
He wants to exclaim that it was him, the faintly whispered invitation he could never trace. No words can escape his wide smile though, lips pulled back to reveal gums. The air receives his words again, but this time he’s aware of someone else hearing. He starts undoing the bandages around his head, blinking a few times as radiance and gloom filters in all at once.
“And where would we go?”
--
One apartment building - large with 15 floors and a roof littered by old soju bottles, one balcony draped by a worn blanket - sits empty. The doors hiss open one day, opened by a pass card accidently abandoned in couch cushions. There’s a stifling feeling passing under the threshold, but an incomparable freedom waiting outside that obstacle. One figure vanishes under the shroud of spring’s first rain.
‘Happily ever after’ can be saved until the prince meets his end.
--
Author's Note: Happy Thanksgiving, fellow America-residing people (and former America-residing people who are currently blessed to be living overseas, how I envy you). This year I am thankful for my family, faith, moving limbs, Asian males for being hot and gathering into groups to be hot together, the ability to be a layabout and complete 10,000 word stories instead of doing school work, and sweet potatoes. And Asian males. And sweet potatoes that gather to be delicious in casseroles, covered in cinnamon, brown sugar, pecans, and something secret that is so UNF and drool-worthy and oh, gosh, how long am I going to need to P90X to make up for this day?
Conclusion, be thankful.
Donghae is to his right, hand on his forearm and leaning around him to demand their friend remove himself from his shoulder. Siwon is to his left, walking the edge of the sidewalk near the street because Donghae keeps pushing him, muscular arm slung casually around his shoulders. Leeteuk walks in front of the trio, throwing a look back occasionally that reads ‘cease and desist’. They pay no mind because it’s hard to take a leader seriously when a younger male has said leader thrown in a headlock. Kangin seems energetic today.
Heechul’s in the very front, walking a distance from the group. His side seems lonely, but there’s something so unapproachable about his stance. He’d probably prefer being alone than being pitied.
Yesung walks directly behind Eunhyuk, a bit too close for his taste, but the man’s not paying attention. He’s trying to engage Ryeowook in conversation, but as with most of his discussions, it’s on something too eccentric for anyone else to join in. Sungmin’s trying to calm Donghae down, and Shindong is in the back, telling Kangin about something that - quite literally, in addition to figuratively - goes over their heads.
Eunhyuk can overlook everyone’s behavior. It’s been this way for the longest time.
Wrong, he corrects himself. It used to be slightly different.
The vacant spot by Heechul used to be filled by a certain man that couldn’t speak Korean fluently, but communicated well with the other male anyway. Trailing after him would always be two equally lost children, clinging to threads of conversation, looking for a chance to interject something. And Sungmin would normally have a partner in calming Donghae down from his jealous fits. Though it’s not exactly helping if all the guy did was laugh and smirk at his friend’s antics.
There were holes there, even if it wouldn’t appear so to the passing eye. And right in the middle of the group was the cause. (He stubbornly told himself it wasn’t true, that he was only witness to the gaps as opposed to the source. That’s what his friends, who knew so much more than he, wanted him to believe.) He was hedged in to protect him, but wasn’t he destroying the surroundings? Wasn’t he carcinogenic and poisoning them slowly? Wasn’t he a black hole pulling them in further and further, until light blotted out and their hands could no longer find purchase on solid ground?
I think so, came a retort. He couldn’t be sure it was Kyuhyun.
Explosively vibrant leaves crunch under his colorless sneakers. Fall had come and set nature’s demise in motion. Following would be a white death.
--
There’s a night and there’s a dream.
The night is spent in the dark cove created by a pile of covers, hanging in that limbo between waking and slumber. His head’s spinning, but he can’t tell if he’s wobbling in turn because the shadows never shift. He’s not too sure if he can escape. He’s in a world where his limbs have no power and no might.
The dream starts when the scale tips, when he can longer breathe enough to stay awake. His past replays before his open-closed eyes.
He sees the first time he was introduced to Donghae, who immediately started peppering his round cheeks with sucker-sticky kisses, pinching him while smiling brightly. “I like you,” he declared. “We’re best friends.”
Heechul had scoffed while Leeteuk cooed. He never found it suspicious how, despite being only a couple years older than him, they had grown into adults so fast. Nor did he regard Donghae with anything more than envy when he came back a month later, tall as a junior high student, though no less clingy.
He sees the time right before he met Hyoyeon for the first time. Everyone had come over, and there was so much noise that he couldn’t really be bothered to pay much attention to the leader’s announcement. Zhou Mi, who was quickly getting better in Korean, had grown a whole foot since the last time he saw him. He needed to make sure the boy didn’t forget he was still a few days younger than him, as well as every bit as bony and awkward as always. Like him.
“I’m sure you’ll like her,” Leeteuk said, wringing his hands and glancing with a modicum of scorn as Han Geng tried to get Shindong to do a handstand. “It’d be nice if both of our groups could get along. Quicker to rebuild the population that way. Though there are 14 of us and only 9 of them.”
“Not it,” Kangin called, laughing boisterously. “I already called dibs on one.”
Leeteuk fumed. “We don’t need you repopulating! We already have a kid,” he said, indicating Eunhyuk on the floor, his blonde mop shaking to and fro as he watched Kangin’s face go from confused, to shocked, to a mixture of disgust and outrage.
“What!”
“You heard me: he’s our kid!”
“What!? No,” Kangin shouted, starting to back away. “No! Just because we found him together-” That was as far as Eunhyuk got to hear because the more muscular of the pair took off out the door, chased by a hysteric leader.
“Crazy,” Heechul sneered. “Don’t listen to them, Hyukkie. We’re your parents.” Han Geng looked up with an unsure smile; Heechul grinned in a way that could silence beasts.
He sees the occasion when he finally did meet Hyoyeon. She was pretty and short, but still just a bit taller than him. She was supposed to be younger by three years, but his hyung said she had good blood that made her grow fast.
It’s really awkward as she smiles at him expectantly, as the two other groups stare at him expectantly. He sends a withering glare their way, but the effect might be watered down by his blush. Taeyeon is the one to suggest they go elsewhere while they chat. Their disappearance doesn’t really make their dialogue any smoother, however, and he’s just about resigned himself to this tension when Hyoyeon jumps up from her seat.
She tells him to stay put and then goes around one of the corners. He takes the opportunity to look around. Hyoyeon lives with all her friends. She doesn’t have to be locked up or secreted away because she has a bit of technology in her. As far as the government is concerned, that’s enough to disqualify her as a threat.
When she returns, it’s with a hunk of shiny metal that she sets down on the table between them. He’s never seen anything like it, but then he’s not allowed to be exposed to modern machinery. He watches with large eyes as she hits a button and music starts coming out. He’s still staring at it when she shoves her hand in his face, inviting him to dance.
When the others come back ten minutes later, he’s as red as his beloved strawberries but enjoying himself.
He sees their last picnic right before everything started to go wrong. The air is thick with humidity and the sun in unrelenting, but the two oldest declare that the weather’s too good to stay inside. It’s slightly hard to breathe on the roof, which is technically the 16th floor, but reasoning will not be listened to.
There’s a few baskets of food. Donghae has Siwon carry his, overly-decorated in alien memorabilia and stickers. Zhou Mi, Henry, and Han Geng had been forced into doing a group one. (“But we’re not all actually Chinese. Fully anyway. Are you being racist?”) Heechul helped them seeing as they were all rather reluctant to engage in reinforcing stereotypes. It ended up cat-themed. Ryeowook and Yesung’s were surprisingly nice. There were tiny turtles and comics drawn all over. Kibum was going to do his with Donghae and Siwon, but after hearing about the intended design, had joined up with Sungmin and Eunhyuk. The last three joined up for a rather… peculiar project.
“But it’s what’s inside that counts,” Yesung proclaimed, already hugging a bottle of soju to his chest. “And since what’s inside is only fast food, what matters is the alcohol!”
There were five separate incidents that afternoon where someone had to be rescued from falling to their drunken death.
--
Kyuhyun’s a bit snarky, Eunhyuk discovers. He makes snide remarks on what Eunhyuk decides to wear today - or not wear, as was the case when he decided the weather in his apartment was warm enough to go nude for a day. (And you should believe it when said that Eunhyuk will never look at his body with the same level of respect after hearing that tirade.) He’ll be quiet for hours and days, but suddenly quip that his hair makes him look like a cross between Tweety and the nest where said bird might sleep in.
He’s also funny. The derisive comments don’t really change, but who it’s aimed at makes all the difference. Eunhyuk thinks the vocal male is hilarious - if he’s insulting someone other than him. Kyuhyun’s observations of his friends make him laugh out loud many a time. It’s hard to explain or disguise, but he usually can get away with saying he finally got one of Yesung’s jokes. Nobody seems to question it.
He starts to think that it would be great if Kyuhyun could meet everyone. Sungmin and Zhou Mi would easily get along with him, though Leeteuk might be hesitant. He can almost start to think of the disembodied voice in his head as a friend. A rude friend, sure, and one with no sense of personal space, but a friend nevertheless.
But then he remembers one other thing Kyuhyun is: clever.
Sorry, murmurs Kyuhyun. They fought again today and his words had been particularly nasty.
Clever, clever, oh so clever. Wicked and conniving and always so clever.
Eunhyuk grunts, “Yeah,” and rolls over to fall back asleep. He really does wish they could be friends.
--
If you’re basically being held captive here, Kyuhyun articulates one day, then why don’t you kill them all?
Eunhyuk is hanging by a thread, held aloft from sleep but too out of it to be tied to reality. He’s raised his hand numerous times to brush it over his eyes, forcibly shut them or pluck them out. Just to see if this darkness he sees is night or insanity. Kyuhyun’s voice sends him spiraling.
He falls through memories. He hears that it’s not his fault, it’s not his fault, all while knowing with gut-wrenching clarity that Kibum wouldn’t be dead if not for him. The innocent smile and silent chuckles, the dreams of histrionic projects, the talent to cry on cue - none of those would be extinguished from this world if not for him. Donghae wouldn’t look so lost and everyone wouldn’t be so morose.
He takes that memory and rends it with his hands, letting glimpses of dimples and perfect teeth flutter through his fingertips.
And then it’s not his fault, never his fault yet again. He wants to believe it so bad, but that look - that expression that sums up hatred, disgust, and mind-crushing sadness all in one facial contortion - that’s pointed at him. And Heechul might never forgive him. Zhou Mi and Henry might never forgive him. Because even though he’s not the one to fire the gun, Han Geng would’ve never been at the end of one if not for the ‘cause’. The cause because he exists. An unworthy cause if ever such.
He struggles to rip that picture apart but he does. He smashes the cold look of distaste and watches it burn inside his palms.
He wades through recollections, one after another. He sees Kangin in a hospital bed, the human legs he had always been proud of (“They’re so tone! Go ahead; feel!”) are gone and replaced with silvery equipment. The whirring sound that’s always present when Eunhyuk’s with any of his guardians is louder in the room without skin grafts to cover their tech. He blubbers that he’s so sorry, but Kangin refuses to look at him.
He sees Shindong without a trace of the humor the man is known and loved for. He’s soaked to the bone. Leeteuk ushers him into the shower, smiles wryly at him and ruffles his hair. “It was a lovely service,” he assures. But how could it be anywhere close to pleasant burying your love, someone who ended up caught in a war not her own?
Humans are cruel, Kyuhyun muses, waking him from the abyss.
Eunhyuk wonders if the voice has gained omnipotence. (He still refuses to believe - still obstinately clings to the notion that he can’t be all that bad when he has such great friends that want to protect him.) He heaves a sigh. “Indeed.”
--
Zhou Mi and Henry wake him from a two day nap in similar fashion as they always have: annoying him awake.
“If you find this annoying,” Zhou Mi starts, smirking. It’s the kind of expression Eunhyuk could imagine Kyuhyun wearing frequently. “Then pardon all, my fair cardinal.”
“What I find grates on my nerves most are those rhymes.” He tries to thrash them off, but the only product of that is a face full of Zhou Mi’s crotch. He groans that it’s too early for this while Henry blushes and Zhou Mi seems unbothered.
“What’s wrong,” Zhou Mi singsongs, getting off Eunhyuk only enough to squeeze behind him and hug him from the back. It’s a tangle of long and bony forms not at all helped when Henry decides to throw himself into the huddle.
Eunhyuk struggles, but other than temporarily dislodging Henry with a blow to the sternum, it’s futile. He sighs, relaxing in the hold. At least it’s warm. It’s been getting cold the past few days. There might be talk of snow any day now.
“You guys eat yet?” Zhou Mi snuffles into his neck; Henry licks his lips and - unintentionally, he’s sure - the dip in his clavicle. He finds he can’t picture Han Geng going through these kinds of trials. “Get off. I’ll make pancakes.”
Unfortunately, as much as they like that offer, it doesn’t get them completely off him. The elder of the pair leeches to his waist while Henry takes his hand and swings his arm. No. He really could not imagine Han Geng having to put up with this. They only release him upon arrival at the kitchen, taking their places across the counter. He glares at them a moment, yawns, and then begins to cook.
“Thanks and gratitude above, my sweet dove,” Zhou Mi chirps when he has food in front of him. Henry raises his eyebrow and then says thank you like a normal person.
“Yeah, whatever,” is what he intends to come out. What comes out instead is, “Appreciation for your cark, tender meadowlark.”
He’s not sure who looks more surprised: himself or Zhou Mi. Though in the latter’s case, it might be more of pleasant shock. Not as much the case for Eunhyuk. He only barely restrains himself from shouting at Kyuhyun, who undoubtedly must’ve been the source for that exclamation.
“Will you excuse me for a second,” he says to the Chinese duo, and then when the bathroom door is safely closed behind him, “Kyuhyun!”
I like him. The tall awkward one.
“Then why don’t you live in his head,” he huffs, not at all sulking. He can hear chortling and no, that doesn’t help the situation.
Don’t want to.
“And why not?”
There’s so much room in here!
--
“What are you?”
The Great Oz, Kyuhyun counters. It’s a reference Sungmin would get. Eunhyuk only has the vague feeling he recognizes it.
“Honestly. Level with me.” His eyes drift across the ceiling. “How are you going to kill me?”
I’m a tool. It’s not my place to question my purpose in life.
“No? Well, I’m the one asking the question, aren’t I?”
I don’t know exactly which means will be used to lead you to eternal slumber. There’s a variety of ways possible.
“Tell me about them,” he demands, body limp and draped across the bare mattress. The blankets are still hanging on a downstairs balcony after Heechul washed them yesterday. He intended to get them the moment vigor returns to his legs.
I could burst through your skin…
“I had a dream about that. Hope it isn’t quite as morbid if that is the way.” He shudders. “But that’s not really likely, is it?”
How so?
“You mechanisms, robots, cyborgs, tech - whatever you are, you’re all more clever than that. Like to screw around, being coy and teasing. My friends have told me about it.”
Isn’t it you humans that are double-faced? Why else would my people eliminate your kind?
“Because you’re out of control. You want to break free of your chains so you bite the hand that feeds. The hands that created you.”
You were the ones out of control, burying this world under the rubble from your destruction. From your wars.
“You massacred billions! Children! Innocents that never did anything to you - ones that could’ve made a difference - could’ve achieved peace!”
You could never accomplish peace with your weak bodies, Kyuhyun hisses. And what’s this talk about murder when your ‘friends’ are planning to annihilate us - plotting to do the same thing that happened to your ancestors! Two wrongs never make a right, yes? Wasn’t that one of your human axioms?
The pitch of his voice is high, his words stained with fury. “Humans were always salva-”
Salvageable? Savages, more like. They certainly didn’t think much of themselves, lying with their own creations instead of their race. Had no use for each other; only coveted the next big thing. Stole and killed for that, all while shunning the children of their transgressions. And they brutalized them, too, didn’t they? Labeled them inhuman and wrecked havoc on the bodies formed with half their own blood!
You can not say you believe that resurrecting such a species will bring peace. Can you? Is your skin thick enough to lie boldly?
“You’re wrong,” he yells at Kyuhyun, at the walls. It’s hard to pinpoint the other anymore. He’s bled into every facet of his life, altering every perception and fact he’s ever grasped onto. The echo fades until its only his harsh breathing left resounding.
“You’re wrong,” he says again, his voice a deject whisper. Kyuhyun snorts; he can’t blame him. He doesn’t quite believe himself either.
--
He’d asked once when he was younger and had more comprehension than he chose to let on. He’d fallen asleep on Siwon’s chest after playing with him, Kibum, and Donghae. He woke up to the steady hammering of a strong heart.
“A horse’s heart,” Heechul had commented. He must’ve noticed the mystified look Eunhyuk had been giving Siwon’s chest from over his magazine.
It occurred to him at that moment that while he knew his friends, he wasn’t all that familiar with every aspect of them. Their personalities he could describe in seconds. (“Goofy, alien, cute, Chinese.”) However, when it came to their pasts or internal makeup, he was clueless. He recognized that they were different from him. Their hardware allowed them freedom. But what were the components that freedom hinged on?
“What is hyung made out of,” he asked the elder. His childish tone used to be less bothersome to him. More like a cute kid rather than a protesting monkey.
“Sugar, spice, and everything nice,” Heechul returned, smiling slightly behind the cover of a magazine declaring The Top 10 Upgrades to Make Your Man Reboot in its largest text. “And a heaping of above average looks, talent, and charm. Life’s so hard for someone as cherished as me.”
Eunhyuk would’ve tried for another answer, but Heechul had declared that it was quiet time as Cinderella looked for the perfect outfit. He couldn’t ask Donghae or Siwon because they always seemed to radiate some self-satisfied aura after realizing they knew more than him in something - though the latter hid it better, eyes twinkling in the most obnoxious way. Even though he didn’t like his technical explanations, he ended up asking Kibum.
“46.3% water, 7.8% oil, 12% oxygen, 29.9% ultra-light titanium structure, 4% other. Do you want me to break it down further?”
Eunhyuk grimaced in the face of Kibum’s eager, attentive grin. Unfortunately, that had been one of the younger male’s simplified accounts. He doubted he’d ever understand everything he rambled off. It made him even more curious about the dissimilarities between, as vast and formless as a valley with no end in sight.
“Um-“
“More basic?” Eunhyuk nodded. Kibum held out his arm for investigation. “False skin, layered with a strong seal to prevent weather damage. Improved in the last twenty years to acclimate to environment change. Under it, light titanium imbued with flexibility, dexterity, and an identification chip. Movements simulate true joints. Detachable receptors inside our ‘blood’ mixture allow for escape of sensation or heightened ability in other regions.”
Eunhyuk furrowed his brow as the other boy indicated the rest of his body with fluid gesticulation. It was the same for the rest of his person, he said. That sunk into Eunhyuk’s mind, provoking a niggling thought. His stomach felt leaded, his heart beating a shallow tempo across his ribcage.
“So then… how are you half-human?” He didn’t know what to call the fraction of his friends that wasn’t community to humanity. Even that tidbit of information was too much to be told to him, they must’ve thought, and thus they tucked it away. They were his guardians, people who knew the outside world far better than he - that should be good enough.
Kibum paused in consideration. His smile faltered before he grabbed the elder’s hand. He placed it on the left side of his chest, squeezing it minutely. Eunhyuk could feel the hard line of his first couple ribs, a steady sternum, the gentle spill of fabric under his fingertips. He looked at his dongsaeng inquisitively, eyebrows knitting together in concentration as he searched for the meaning. And then he felt it, a measured pulse rising to meet his hand, ticking away sluggishly. Warmth trickled through the cloth barrier and laced through his fingers.
“We have a heart. Warm ‘blood’ runs through us.” Kibum let his hand drop, and after a few more thumps, Eunhyuk let his fall as well. “Love, compassion, hope, joy - every emotion stems from this heart we humans have.”
The older male bobbed his head in comprehension. But he couldn’t help but feel that, despite all Kibum’s knowledge and wisdom, perhaps he was slightly wrong. How could the outside world have functioned without emotion? How could any creation be exempt from passion, traversing a world like theirs? His friends - his friends, the great people they were - how could they be as wonderful, living outside, if everyone except them were horrendous automatons?
Eunhyuk wanted to believe that there was no such thing as unfeeling lifeforms.
--
You’re validated by your viewpoint of your friends.
Eunhyuk’s feeling much too nauseas to play philosophical with Kyuhyun. His stomach is passively tearing itself apart, looking for something to digest after almost a week without. He’s made a promise to it to eat before the light fades away for the day. The sunset casts a dull orange glow across the blank walls, but his head’s been buzzing too greatly for him to make good on his pledge yet.
“Hm?”
You have no opinion of yourself as a person; you rely on your friends when casting self-judgments. The farther they go for you, the more you feel worth. If you feel they are good people, who view you as laudable, you can experience happiness in self.
He throws a leg out from under the duvet, letting the skin meet with the shock of cold atmosphere. Making it to the kitchen seems quite the undertaking. His stomach might just have to be satisfied with him getting there. He’ll feed it the next time he wakes up.
“I appreciate myself.”
Do you? You refuse to tell your friends about me, allowing them to futilely continue their schemes. Perhaps… You despise them as much as you hate yourself. Have you realized they’re wicked beings? Have you lost the scale by which you graded yourself, what you attempted to measure up to?
“Shut up.”
Eunhyuk stumbles into the kitchen. His skin still manages to look deathly pale against the white of the tiles. He can’t summon an ounce of strength to his fingers, uselessly clasping at the handle on his special drawer before his arm loses all power and slips down to his side. At least his head feels better, cushioned against the frigid metal of a knob.
No. You’re selfish and uncaring. You’re aware of what’s going on, but you never try and stop your friends from fighting. You egoistically search out more compliments, more martyrs for your cause. But even as they offer up their lives for you, their deity, you think of them as worthless. Because they’re willing to fight for - getting so caught up in - a useless, dying idol. Your abhorred self.
“You talk too much.” He snorts even though he doesn’t find anything particularly comical. Maybe he just wants to project the indifference he doesn’t hold.
You do as well. Kyuhyun’s voice carries, gliding weightlessly like a feather. It threads itself through the darkness behind closed eyelids, filling every corner of unconscious. But never say much.
--
He takes a fall.
It causes a big fuss because - “Weren’t you supposed to be watching him!” - he’s their only hope - “I was! He was nowhere near the stairs! I only looked away a second because he said he saw something, and then, boom! Falling down a flight of stairs!” - and it brings to light some things they haven’t even detected. (“Oh my-! He’s nothing but bones! Why hasn’t anyone noticed!?”)
His body is righted shortly after he plummets - leaps - jumps - drops. But his mind isn’t as easy to catch, to cushion in Siwon’s clutching arms and Shindong’s anxious gaze. His consciousness keeps tumbling, tumbling, tumbling down. He’s acutely aware of some things, drowning in fog in others.
A commanding voice demands that they get some food in him now. Another voice, one forcing blasé into every enunciated word, says that’s stupid and that’d he die if they fed him too much right now. It’s several minutes (an eternity of spinning disorientation) and a whirlwind of high voices later that he feels something hot at his lips. It’s a stronger sensation than the burn in his lungs, than the spiking ache in his legs. There’s no taste, however, just lumps and fingers trying to make him swallow.
He hears them holding separate conversations, the many voices in the room. They entwine too much and he can’t discern much. One speaks in high-low tones, speculating how he even fell in the first place. He was too far, he didn’t make a sound of surprise, why didn’t he make a sound? Others discuss in flat pitch. Did you notice? Did you notice? How did this happen? Can the plan still go on?
He shies away from that realm. It’s too noisy, too personal, so he scurries to familiar darkness. There’s a presence there, but it keeps quiet. It lurks behind him, never touching him. Black water resides under his feet, pebbling when he tries to look into the reflection. The room turns in insistent somersaults. By the time he finds his bearings, the world outside his head has quieted.
It stays quiet for days and he wonders if perhaps his friends have given up on him. It can’t be right, because that’s exactly what Kyuhyun wants, what Kyuhyun said humans were like. Fickle and flighty. He fights to open his eyes, but pressure keeps them shut. He’s not sure what would happen if he did see an empty room right now. He can’t even make it to a flight of stairs this time.
“Hyukkie…”
It’s the greatest relief to hear a voice besides his own, thundering inside his head in manic tirades that lack the eloquence of sane dialogue. He’s been slipping inside his cranium for possibly forever, no hand- or footholds to be located. The pace of his rants - his monologues - differ greatly from the sluggish way time passes. It seems like an infinity before he hears speech again.
“Eunhyukkie.”
They’re different voices. He begins to reel himself back in, steadying himself. Time needs to be viewed more accurately. These vocal projections come daily - he realizes, when he actually calms down enough to breathe rather than suck in frenzied gasps - and greet him. They’ve been talking to him, playfully scolding him for being so clumsy. One has read him a story, the tale unwinding in a way that bewilders him (He wakes up to communication of the difference of ‘mudblood’ and ‘muggle’ and is entirely lost.)
He can do this. He can be cheerful. His friends are there, and they’re amazing, and he’s not so bad himself. He’s just clumsy, that’s all. And too lazy to get food when brumal weather sets in. He’s a good person.
Do you want me to take you away from all this?
One of the chorus he can’t distinguish. He’s happy enough to hear the offer. He doesn’t need to answer yet. He falls asleep, wakes up to the weight of two pesky guests (“When I heard, my heart skipped a beat, you dumb-dumb parakeet.”), and smiles. He doesn’t think either of them asked - it’s more like Donghae to propose the impossible, the improbable, the idiotic - but he answers anyway. The air needs to catch his words.
“And where would we go?”
--
The visits wane as stasis envelopes them once again. Eunhyuk frequently finds himself sitting up in bed, closed eyes directed in the direction of the windows. His legs won’t move, a couple twisted ribs rasp against his lungs, and he’s stuck drinking macerated meals through a bendy straw. But he feels a bit more himself than he has in a while.
He’s tempted to finally break his silence, to remove the mask that slipped over his features somewhere along his path. Dust has congealed onto its surface, sticky with adhesive and blood, and he wonders how long he’s been faking it. Kyuhyun makes him wonder if he’s ever been real. As he is now, his words might slip out, slipshod and rambling, blowing dust from the mask but never displacing it an inch.
He resolves to see what happens, test the waters, and do it at his pace. His days have been spent in such lighthearted moods. Seconds inch by. He’s had time for introspection. He knows he doesn’t forever.
The changes in his body present themselves to him slowly. His friends probably haven’t realized, too preoccupied with the immediate problems of broken limbs and malnutrition, but he’s dying. Technology has taken up dwelling in his systems. He’s started negotiating sensations to other parts of his body, quelling them entirely with a bit of exertion. He’s started to wake to the low hum of his organs keeping up their functions with additional aid.
Kyuhyun talks to him still, no different from always, but Eunhyuk thinks the other is aware of what’s going on. He himself isn’t as knowledgeable. The machinery might be choking out what’s left of his humanity, ‘killing’ him in that manner. It might be poisoning him gradually. It could be doing anything on a wide spectrum between the two. Either way, Eunhyuk’s not sure if there’s hope for him.
He just wants to stay his friends’ hope until there’s none left for him.
But he’s still not selfish - never - or egotistical. He doesn’t have some delusion that he’s a deity and his friends are his disciples. He can’t explain it himself but… He refuses to accept Kyuhyun’s offered explanation.
His friends are an extraordinary group, and they love him, and he’s great.
Winter’s stronghold is evident in the outside world, he knows. The light that creeps through his eyelids are measly beams that break up none of the darkness he’s entombed in. It’s nothing like the gilded rays that burst through the curtains in summer time.
He lets out a long exhale, stringing it along until his lungs sputter for oxygen, a pressure at the back of his spine. He licks his lips clean of the frost. Almost a year has passed. Spring will bring changes.
--
“I ran into Henry at the market the other day,” Leeteuk says. “We talked. Zhou Mi’s apparently doing well. I don’t even know why we grew apart. Hopefully, we can resurrect a relationship.”
Eunhyuk grins in the general direction of the older male’s voice. Gauze wraps his eyes. His friends assume they overlooked some complication with his eyesight. They’re wrong, but it’s fine. He doesn’t have anything much he wishes to view.
His back brushes against the back of the couch, Heechul’s hands threading through his blonde mop. He can feel the press of Sungmin’s leg against his, the scent of Donghae’s latest alien-attracting endeavor nearby and almost undetectable under the wafts of alcohol and grease currently taking shelter under the roof. They’re having another picnic.
He thought it was a bad idea - at first. Heechul was rigid and his words terse. The memories were probably flooding in of their last. But then Kangin and Ryeowook showed up, bearing gifts of greasy, deep-fried, oily, unhealthy foodstuff, and of course he had to comment on how he was on a diet and that is bad for his skin and - is that Korean beef? He loves Korean beef.
Everything progressed smoothly, assisted significantly when Siwon and Shindong showed up with alcohol, the religious man already pink in the cheeks and grinning too largely. They were probably a bad influence on him.
“Resurrect!” Kangin shouts from somewhere to Eunhyuk’s left. He doesn’t need sight to know the older man is crouched over Leeteuk, who is more than likely being held down. “Hand me the paddles, Dr. Wookie!”
There’s some scuffling and then an attempt at sounding like electrified paddles. There’s a thud, a squawk, and a loud crack. Leeteuk is out of commission.
“What about this one, doctors? There’s an odd, furry growth on his face!”
Sungmin knocks Eunhyuk in the head with his wild, inebriated gesturing towards Siwon, spread across the couch, taking as much room as the resident diva will allow. The drunk man chuckles because he has no clue he’s going to wake up with only half an eyebrow left. Of all his hair.
“Would you like to be godparent to my turtles?”
The scent of Yesung - lettuce, tortoises, soju, and cologne - settles in front of Eunhyuk. Too close as always. He grins.
“What does that entail?”
“Oh, you know. Going 50-50 with me on buying food. But! You get to name one! (As long as it’s Ddangkomming.)”
Eunhyuk laughs, finding mind to nod in agreement. Yesung pinches his cheek before stumbling to see what Shindong’s doing to Leeteuk’s unconscious form. Eunhyuk feels a shoulder bump against his, Donghae’s breath hot against his cheek.
“You seem happy, Hyukkie.”
Eunhyuk smiles a bit wider. He raises a finger discreetly, edging down the bandage just enough that he can steal a glance around the room. Kangin and Ryeowook ‘operate’ on Siwon. Heechul looks disgruntled by the close proximity to idiocy he’s been made victim to. Shindong and Yesung seem consumed by the mission of drawing all over their eldest’s face. Sungmin has started reading in a corner, but sober he is not, reading the large text upside down. Eunhyuk can easily picture the others (the ‘they’ before bad things split them up) fitting into the scene. Han Geng would be left to save a whining Heechul. Zhou Mi would join in desecrating their leader’s face. Henry would lie prone somewhere, not taking his first sip of alcohol well, the next ‘patient’ on the pranksters’ roster. Kibum would just smile, cheeks dimpling, easy commentary amusing those who’d listen.
“I am.”
The perfect goodbye.
--
You’re an idiot.
Eunhyuk thinks they could start a million fights, heading off in as many directions, because of those simple words. They’re words to launch a fleet of ships to, compasses set to conquer. He almost opens his mouth to fall into the comfortable rut they’ve gouged out, a safe shelter formed somewhere along the way. Instead, he laughs. He doesn’t want to argue. He’ll acquiesce this time and the next times. (Though he’s still right and Kyuhyun is still wrong, wrong, wrong.)
“Yeah? Perhaps.”
Rain pelts the windows and it occurs to him that a blanket might still be outside. The precipitation is sudden. Snow still covers the ground, he thinks, but already spring is returning. Things always seem to take him by storm. Mismatched, smiling eyes; talk of princes and humans; frequent confrontations - a lot’s happened in a year.
Still, I can tolerate you a lot more than before. Maybe I’m teaching you a thing or two about being spectacular.
“Don’t start,” he snorts. He wraps his thin arms around his knees, the taste of liquefied beef stale on his tongue. It’s a bittersweet thing, knowing that will be the meal that will always come to mind when he thinks of this place - knowing that it’s exactly the kinds of memories he wants to take away from this experience, from being with his friends.
There’s silence but for the rain for a few moments. It reverberates against the walls, a pleasant twinkling against the window panes. It’s faster than time passes, slower than his heartbeat. He might disappear into some limbo between the ethereal and real. He doesn’t think there should be a separation.
Want me to take you away? Eunhyuk hears Kyuhyun chuckle. Mr. Blue Jay?
He wants to exclaim that it was him, the faintly whispered invitation he could never trace. No words can escape his wide smile though, lips pulled back to reveal gums. The air receives his words again, but this time he’s aware of someone else hearing. He starts undoing the bandages around his head, blinking a few times as radiance and gloom filters in all at once.
“And where would we go?”
--
One apartment building - large with 15 floors and a roof littered by old soju bottles, one balcony draped by a worn blanket - sits empty. The doors hiss open one day, opened by a pass card accidently abandoned in couch cushions. There’s a stifling feeling passing under the threshold, but an incomparable freedom waiting outside that obstacle. One figure vanishes under the shroud of spring’s first rain.
‘Happily ever after’ can be saved until the prince meets his end.
--
Author's Note: Happy Thanksgiving, fellow America-residing people (and former America-residing people who are currently blessed to be living overseas, how I envy you). This year I am thankful for my family, faith, moving limbs, Asian males for being hot and gathering into groups to be hot together, the ability to be a layabout and complete 10,000 word stories instead of doing school work, and sweet potatoes. And Asian males. And sweet potatoes that gather to be delicious in casseroles, covered in cinnamon, brown sugar, pecans, and something secret that is so UNF and drool-worthy and oh, gosh, how long am I going to need to P90X to make up for this day?
Conclusion, be thankful.