[Fic] When all other lights go out (Oneshot)
Title:When all other lights go out.
Pairing: Jaemin
Length: Oneshot
Genre: fantasy, angst,
Summary: He dared to go to the place where stars fell, all for a single wish.
A/N: I had a creepy dream about catching stars in a swamp...and this is what it turned into after taking out the alligators and adding in jaemin kekeke XD it could be edited and improved..but i dont have any more inspirations so this is what is is ~ enjoy <3
*~~
~*
They wished for love.
Small and lost amid a sea of broken dreams and fading lights, stolen hopes carried far away upon the restless hands of a tide that would never return.
They wished for the return of their other half, the mirror to their soul, grown too sick and weary from the loneliness of separation. Yearning for the sweet balmy kiss of love to envelop them once more and for the one and only love that could complete them.
Torn apart before they were even given a chance, one whole divided mercilessly into two and cast out into the dark bleak world in an eternal fight to reclaim what they had lost.
They wished for love.
And they wished for each other.
Because all other lights had gone out.
They closed their eyes and they wished.
Standing alone on the edge of the swamp, he gazed out across the dismal ragged expanse of slick mud and reedy plants. The ground was half submerged in softly bubbling water that popped and belched forth rancid gas as the heat far below the surface found its way up through cracks and holes.
Wispy curls of smoke wafted up in lazy spirals from the surface of the boiling pools, a pungent thick fog draping itself suffocatingly across the tips of the grass as the marsh buzzed and simmered with the acrid scent of decay. The air was dense and humid, expanding hot and unbreathable within ones very lungs.
The urge to cover his mouth and nose was fierce and instinctive, his eyes watering as he squinted through the gloom, barely resisting the urge to curl into himself and gag on the nearly poisonous fumes.
His ears still rang faintly with the harsh warnings thrown at him from the safety of the village he’d left behind not too long before. But even the sharp prick of fear he’d felt as pair after pair of eyes darkened and shuttered faded slowly to nothing more than an odd sense of detachment. The uncomfortable press of unease as time and life stopped. His form so lonely, small and frail, as he hovered on the edge of the mire.
Here the earth itself had turned predator, as dangerous and enthralling as a sleeping creature, steam hissing lazily from its bowels. As if the marshy ground, gutted and wounded by gaping pit holes filled with rotten water, was breathing, thick and wet and hungry. It breathed and it sighed. And it waited.
Waited for the foolish or unwary to attempt to navigate through, for a rash or brave soul to take a single misstep, to stumble into a final murky embrace of death. It wheezed and gurgled as it lay in wait. Wait for prey. Wait for him.
And he waited with it.
He waited for something only spoken of in old wives tales and fabled stories woven through the mysterious history of the land. For something of magic and miracles. For promises of the impossible. He wait for the stars to fall. For the stars to fall, and for his wish to be granted.
It was here that they said it happened. In the least likely spot, in a place where death and rot lay crusted and mottled on the surface of ground that lay like torn skin with wide open sores. Broken putrid ground. Where no beauty or life remained. Yet the only place in the world that those majestic unreachable stars dropped towards the waiting earth below. A place where stars could be caught if one could navigate the treacherous swamp and capture one before it was lost to the bog.
They said a single star was more than enough to change a man’s life, one was enough to change the world if he so wished. In exchange for catching one, a man had the power to ask for anything his heart desired, could ask for riches or knowledge, could ask for secrets no one but the silent observing stars knew. The possibilities were limitless, and nothing was more covetous than the promise of one’s deepest wishes being granted.
But he wasn’t here for simple material things, he didn’t care to gain things he couldn’t properly protect should others then attempt to steal his fortune away from him. No. He’d already had too many things forcibly taken from him in his short life. He had lost so much. Lost something most precious to him. And it was the only thing he wanted with his whole heart. It was why he was here, to dare, to cast himself forward and beg for a miracle.
If the legends were true, he would do whatever it took, risk his life and disregard all warnings, if only he could catch a single star. A star that could give him his lost self back. The half of himself he loved more than life itself, the soulmate that had been ripped cruelly away as they were split and lost to unknown ends of the earth.
The unbearable ache, the empty hollowness of living alone and heartbroken, a half to a whole, a half he didn’t want to be if it meant separation forever. A shadow of a soul as he was constantly plagued by an insatiable longing, a grating sense of incompletion. An incurable sickly heart, as the feeble organ struggled to support him on what little strength it had. A man with nothing left to live for if the stories proved false and he couldn’t get a wish here tonight.
Broken and desperate, there was nothing he wanted more, nothing he wouldn’t try to be reunited and complete at last.
Big dark eyes searched the fog smeared sky for any sign of the stars. Ears strained to hear some indication of their approach over the oozing sound of foul muddy water.
He almost didn’t believe his eyes the moment the first streak of white-blue light cut through the velvet night sky so far above. A glittering ball that crackled and danced across air as it descended, twirling and rolling as if running upon the wind. Falling down towards the marsh, and he watched it with baited breath and his heart pounding in his throat.
So far away, even as it drew nearer, shooting out across the endless expanse of swamp illuminating gloomy greens and browns, much too fast and far for a small human like him to even hope of running to catch it before it met the ground. He watched with disbelieving awe as hardly had it passed out of sight than two more brilliant sparks appeared and fell down after it from amidst the vast infinite blackness.
His body trembled, awash with growing excitement that was a tangled ball of nerves in the pit of his stomach. His mind consciously resisting the knowledge that he had to step foot in the toxic swamp to even have the slimmest chance of getting a star, because he knew he was risking his life to try and get something that might not even be possible.
He could fail to avoid one of those sickly churning pools that would suck him down, down and devour him alive. He could catch his star only to be burned alive by its intensely hot flames. He could get his star and make a wish only to find the stories to be false and all of it come to nothing. He could get his wish, only to find that it wasn’t what he’d really wanted.
Nothing was certain, everything rested on chance and miracles, but as the sky brightened to a deep royal blue as it was lit by countless stars arcing down before him like fireworks, he felt that they were calling for him. That this was where he would end everything, that this would bring him final rest and peace, acceptance, or if it were bestowed upon him, a fulfilling miracle.
So he took his first step into the springy wet grass that lined the edge of the dangerous waters, oppressive hot sticky air wrapping around him with each step. One eye on his path and one on the sky alight with glittering sparkling light, and his heart thundered in his ears like a drum. Urging him on, faster, faster, and filling him with an unshakeable sense of urgency. Time suddenly had begun ticking again, and he was already countless paces deep into the wilderness of the swamp.
He didn’t know how far he had come or where he was going, only focused on the stars that now rained down around him on all sides. None close enough to reach, but he could see more clearly now. Could see the way they tumbled helplessly through the air with nothing to slow their fall but greedy water that leaped from its bed to catch them, smothering their gleaming light with mud, strangling their clear bell like voices with acid that fizzled and ate away at them until they gave up at last and slowly drowned, sinking quietly beneath the surface.
He could see now. In a rotten swamp awash with light, the way the ground convulsed and buckled, stars splashing and dotting its surface, gleaming fiercely as they fought its hold, the whole place alive with the shrill cries of the stars as they collided, the discordant rumbling whispers as they struggled to free themselves, and failed. Every single one of them.
It struck something deep within him. That something wasn’t quite right...that something infinitely more dangerous than he’d imagined was lurking in the place that glittered beautifully surreal around him now.
Another flash of brightness drew his attention, and he turned back to the sky above. It was so far away at first, coming swiftly closer like all the others, before it began to fall faster and steeper. Right towards him. Closer than any before, brighter and larger than any star he’d yet seen. It whistled through the air as it seared the navy sky burnt gold. Crackling fire a streaming tail flaring behind it. Aiming for where he stood stiffly as if turned to stone.
A star, his star, it was coming for him. And regardless of if he died here in the swamp or died in the flaming embrace of his star, one last surge of desperate hope burst in his chest, pushing him into action.
He staggered as he tore his feet heavily from where they’d been ensnared in weeds, stumbling over uneven footing and craggy roots, half splashing through puddles that sucked eagerly at his feet. He barely paid attention to his path now, merely trying to keep his footing as his eyes were blinded by the brilliance of the approaching comet.
Stretching his arms preemptively in supplication, breath catching in his throat and heartbeat constricting his chest, he pushed himself fearlessly on. He reached up, body arching, hoping and begging with all that he had for it to be just enough, to be able to intercept it in its final sail towards the ground.
Spinning, tumbling, falling and falling, closer and closer. Arms thrown out and up to receive it. A flash of heat above, waves of air rippling with warmth too hot to bear, blindingly brilliant, sparking stars in his eyes and turning the world before him white. Something searing hot brushed his fingertips a second before he tripped, one foot plunging knee deep into the mud, thrown heavily to his stomach with a bone crushing thud that knocked the wind out of him.
Laying stunned in the wet grass, he gasped and coughed for air as his star passed out of his reach. Dismay pierced through the numb pain that shook his body, watching in disbelief as the star shot to the ground like a fire dart, not three paces away from where he’d fallen.
Lightning sparked on the surrounding plants, all much too saturated with water and mud to catch fire. His arms stretched feebly towards it, just barely out of his reach. Unable to move quick enough, just too far to save it, but close enough to see.
To see the dancing sprite in the heated center of the star, white sparks of eyes glittering at him, a fiery small form twisting and dancing out of control seconds before impacting. A spray of thick mud greeted its entry, sizzling water gushing as steam rose from the hot ball that sunk easily into its waiting embrace.
He watched transfixed, paralyzed with shock as the star screamed and wailed right before him, struggling and fighting the muddy hands that wrapped around it and devoured its brightness. Its fire snuffed out with a puff of white smoke, light fading as it died before his eyes. The shrill whistles lingering in the heavy air around him were the only remnants of perishing souls, as all the lights one by one slowly blinked out.
He scrambled on hands and knees, splashing through the mud, dragging his sodden heavy limbs through leaves that stung and rose fierce welts across pale white skin. Sweat drenched his body and matted his hair to his head as wide eyes filled with crystalline tears.
Denial, disbelief. Despair.
The pool he looked into frantically was rippling and churning, as if digesting a still weakly fighting prey. The dim husk of his star reflected pitifully through the murky water, and a dry sob tore brokenly from his parched throat.
He never should have come.
It wasn’t supposed to be like this. Not like this. Not when here, laying close to the ground, he could feel the earth rumble and heave, belching sickly up through layers far deep below him. Low moans and cries of tortured souls trapped and dying.
A graveyard of stars, a graveyard of dreams and wishes. And he was lost and alone in the center. He felt his will to continue wither and die along with the stars.
Because the next star that flew directly above him illuminated the eerily silent swirling pool at his feet. And a single more clear glance into its watery depths and he was stumbling back in horror. White bleached bones and rotting skin with hair still attached floating spread out under the water like a fan. Empty eye sockets that stared back at him from the realms of death. The skeletal grin on its face striking fear through him like a knife.
He turned from the sight, hobbling blindly away, feet catching on grass and slipping on mud, while around him the wails and screams increased in volume. Each hole that he passed now revealed another watery grave to unfortunate victims of the past, stars sinking down to join them in eternal rest.
The marsh was a living hell of death, and the reality of it struck him dumb, mind numb with incomprehension and blinded by the flashing brightness of the stars which continued to plummet towards their end around him.
He had to get out. Had to return to safety. Gasping and choking on air that was thick with the acrid smoke of doused stars and the wet fumes of the poisonous land that had killed them. Eyes darted frantically around to find the way back, to see the line of the forest he’d foolishly left behind as the stars mesmerized him and led him away from safety.
Nothing but swamp stretched around him on all sides, and panic set in with a vengeance. Frozen to the spot, unable to run for fear of sending himself even deeper into the cursed land. There was no way out. Nothing to do but watch helplessly as the beautiful innocence of the stars was murdered and slaughtered around him.
Endlessly long minutes of painfully wheezing the increasingly unbreathable air, not enough oxygen making his head feel light and spin dangerously. He swayed where he stood, feet already sinking ever so slowly into the springy wet soil now that he’d stopped. Hope of escape steadily slipped from his chest as he realized hollowly that he would still get his wish. He would be reunited with his missing loved one just as he’d dreamed of, but only through death.
Deeper and deeper into billowy waves of despondency, already giving up as his ankles were soon submerged in cold mud. He turned big blank eyes to the sky once more. There were fewer of them now, though the swamp still swarmed and buzzed with the deaths of the previous stars and imprisoned souls of the dead.
No longer did they glow beautifully in his eyes. They were burning and cascading helplessly to their deaths. The earth that should be bestowing life instead stealing it away, betraying everything he’d believed in as it desecrated something so infinitely beautiful and magical.
He shook his head slowly as a low plaintive cry drifted across the smokey battleground and curled around glistening stalks of the grass that clung to his wet legs and stung him with their poison. He didn’t want to listen anymore, terrified and repulsed by the thought that these sounds would be the last thing he ever heard.
Trying to distance himself from the present, he closed his eyes against the scene, pressing his hands over his ears in an attempt to block out everything. No more. He couldn’t bear it anymore.
But the sound came again, soft and urgent, almost panicked. And he thought his ears must be tricking him, a cry that sounded nearly human against the high pitched ringing of the stars, and it could only be the swamp trying to lure him deeper before it swallowed him as well.
The moaning cries rose and fell on the air, patching through green mist and half strangled by the more fierce screams of the stars. Soon it was melting into something like sobs, and he slowly opened his eyes. Unable to keep the sound from seeping into his head, spiraling down his spine and sinking fingers into his gut.
And he couldn’t resist the instinctive urge to find the person uttering such heartbreaking sounds. He couldn’t stop himself from sludging forward once more, following the trail of the sound, peering through the fog and relying on the fading lights to illuminate his way.
It grew louder as he slowly drew nearer, soft squelching grass and mud beneath his feet enough noise to alert the other of his approach, but the sobs didn’t cease nor falter. Another few paces and he cleared a patch of thick reedy grass, forcing his way through them even as they clawed and clung to him like hands. Tearing himself out of their grasp to the sting of their fingers marking his skin, he stumbled at last onto a small island of harder ground.
Blinking rapidly to clear his eyes, he was surprised to find a boy collapsed onto the ground before him. The other was curled into himself as if in pain, but as he took a cautious step forward, he saw him to be clasping his hands to his chest protectively, almost as if he were holding something.
His body shook and rocked as he cried weakly into the night, each breath ragged and breathy, as if every single sob pained him greatly.
He stood uncertainly for a while, merely watching, wringing his hands in indecision as the sad sound of the boy twisted his heart and called for him to do something.
He took a tentative step closer, legs shaking as the effort of forcing himself through mud and water began to take its toll. One hand stretched out carefully in a gentle placating gesture.
“A-are...you okay?”
The boy’s trembling body suddenly went still at the sound of his voice. He paused where he was still a step away, but by just leaning forward a little more he would be able to reach out to touch him.
Slowly, the boy raised his head as if it were impossibly heavy. Big brown eyes lifted up to meet his gaze, glistening tear tracks running down his cheeks, but the light in them was dull. Dull and blank, as if he’d seen the horrors of the world, and he knew as well that there was nothing more horrible than watching the stars die before your very eyes.
The boy stared at him soullessly, body twitching and curling reflexively as shuddering breaths still racked his form, tears slowly dripping from his eyes as his hands clenched more insistently against his chest. And his eyes dropped down to look more closely.
His lips parted, eyes widening as he stared. It couldn’t be...had this boy actually caught one?
Unconsciously he took another step closer to the other, dropping to his knees before him, stunned and confused. His brain was unable to catch up, couldn’t fathom why the other was in such distress when he’d been so lucky to actually catch one. The odds were all against them, and he had been certain the task was nearly impossible until now. His heart raced with excitement and he leaned closer almost eagerly.
That was until he saw the blood. And his stomach dropped out nauseatingly in one horrible swooping moment.
The boy’s hands were smeared and covered with it, thick and darkly black-red against pale skin in the faint light, running down his forearms and staining his clothes. Flecks of it were splattered across his chest and face, as if what he now held safely in his hands had exploded its life out on him. And it couldn’t be.
He couldn’t move, couldn’t speak, eyes flickering between the empty lost face and the bloody mess cradled to his chest, mind gone blank with the assumption of what had happened. With the realization that the stars all died regardless of where they fell. And the mark they left on those lucky enough, unfortunate enough, to catch them seemed drastically unfair.
His heart was breaking as he continued to stare helplessly at the sight before him, wishing he could deny what he was seeing. Wishing he could undo it or change it as tears of regret blurred his vision. He wished he never had come here to witness such sadness and destruction.
But as the broken cries of the other slowly calmed to irregular sharp intakes of air, he lifted his gaze back to his face, blinking rapidly to try and clear the water from his eyes.
The other was looking at him now, soft doe eyes focusing and clearing as he stared almost as if in awe. Like he couldn’t believe there was suddenly someone before him now, like he couldn’t believe that it was him of all people to have found him. He didn’t know why the look made his heart skip a beat, the light sparking deep in those eyes making him feel as if he were something special, as if he wasn’t just another person but one of the stars.
He swallowed thickly, searching the boy’s face for answers he was too cowardly and afraid to ask, but the other was suddenly opening his mouth to speak.
“...It’s you...”
Nothing more than a low whisper of wonder, an answer to a question, as if he had been waiting for him, impossible as it was, waiting and hoping and wishing, and that finally his wish had been granted.
He looked at him in incomprehension, brow furrowing slightly as the strange tightness of his chest made it hard to breathe. Did this boy know him? And why was he still looking at him like that?
“W-what?” He asked stupidly, voice soft and hesitant, hardly louder than the sound of the marsh still frothing and steaming just behind the stirring grass.
“I wished...” He leaned forward slightly as he spoke, eyes shinning with the light of someone who believed, someone who still dreamed. “I wished on this star.” Long fingers curled ever so slightly around the precious object clasped in his hands.
He didn’t know what to think. It looked as if the other had gone crazy, lost to the reality of having blood on his hands. It would explain why he could still possibly claim the dying star had granted his wish. It just couldn’t be possible. He knew it was not possible. But he wished with all his heart that maybe it just was.
And he had to ask. “What did you wish for?”
The other took a long slow shuddering breath before his lips slowly curved into a smile, lovely and in love and his eyes were glowing, dancing, and in that moment he was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen. More beautiful than the stars that streaked the sky behind him, and he ached and longed for him even before he heard the answer. An answer his loudly beating heart had known before he could even consciously comprehend it.
“I wished...for love.”
Sinking into his chest like warm honey, echoes and strains of a long ago forgotten whisper. A voice he felt he should know, a face he felt he’d been missing. And a soul that could only be his. Theirs.
“I wished for you.”
And it was too unbearably perfect. Too much for him to believe it was really here happening to him. The half he had lost, the soulmate that had been stolen from him before he even knew he had lost him, had called for him first. He had searched and found him first.
New hot tears pricked behind his eyes as he stared at the other in wonder, in apology, in happiness, and his heart was pounding fiercely as if it were trying to leap from his chest and pour endless love onto the perfect being before him.
“I wished for you.” A slight strain to that sweet voice as emotion clouded and deepened it, ringing beautiful with undoubted certainty. He reached a hand out before he even knew what he was doing to brush fingers across the warm tears that once more rolled down pale cheeks. Unable to fight back his own tears, and his fingertips tingled with amazement as the reality and warmth of the other breathed across his skin. “And here you are.”
And then his soulmate was opening his hands, dropping them from his chest and revealing what lay fragile and precious in his two palms. Ruby red drops still rolled from it slowly as with each faint beat the heart within the safety of those hands shivered and pulsed its remaining life into the world.
It was too small and broken, nothing more than a half of what it should be, of what it once was before, of what it could finally become again as the responding leap of his own heart in his chest was more than enough answer. As if it could recognize the small dying piece as part of its own. As if it anticipated being reunited once more.
It was all he could do to just trust his heart, follow its urgent command to repair what had been broken. And as he looked from the faintly beating heart to the glowing eyes of his other half, he knew there was nothing he wanted more in the whole entire world.
At last he had found him. They would finally be complete. And his hands trembled uncontrollably as he reached to cup them around the other’s. Warmth seeped through the touch, and he could feel nothing but each fading weak thud that seemed to shake the air, the very earth around them.
He lifted his eyes from their joined hands, to seek out those big trusting eyes. The ones that were soft and deep with so much love. “You wished for the both of us.” He whispered at last, fingers tightening around the other’s as he moved forward.
All the gratitude and happy disbelief pouring from eyes that caressed a face more beloved than all treasures. Years of longing and heartache from a crippling separation was finally coming to an end, and all at once a love and bliss he’d never felt before washed over his entire being as they leaned into each other.
Joined hands pressed between their chests as their lips met softly to seal them as one. Light bloomed out from between fingers that interlaced around a heart that now came to life and beat as one, spilling its life and heat into two sides now clasped so closely together.
Never to be undone again as two halves of a split heart melted back into one inseparable conjoined whole, binding and sealing in a truth that would last forever. Kisses broken by smiles as warm hands curled around cold ones, a low husky chuckle answered by a musical laugh, and the light of falling stars dimmed before the radiance that was their happiness.
Perfection was found hand in hand, with traces of love dancing on their lips.
A new light was born that was all their own.
So they opened their eyes and they lived.
*~
Pairing: Jaemin
Length: Oneshot
Genre: fantasy, angst,
Summary: He dared to go to the place where stars fell, all for a single wish.
A/N: I had a creepy dream about catching stars in a swamp...and this is what it turned into after taking out the alligators and adding in jaemin kekeke XD it could be edited and improved..but i dont have any more inspirations so this is what is is ~ enjoy <3
*~~
~*
They wished for love.
Small and lost amid a sea of broken dreams and fading lights, stolen hopes carried far away upon the restless hands of a tide that would never return.
They wished for the return of their other half, the mirror to their soul, grown too sick and weary from the loneliness of separation. Yearning for the sweet balmy kiss of love to envelop them once more and for the one and only love that could complete them.
Torn apart before they were even given a chance, one whole divided mercilessly into two and cast out into the dark bleak world in an eternal fight to reclaim what they had lost.
They wished for love.
And they wished for each other.
Because all other lights had gone out.
They closed their eyes and they wished.
Standing alone on the edge of the swamp, he gazed out across the dismal ragged expanse of slick mud and reedy plants. The ground was half submerged in softly bubbling water that popped and belched forth rancid gas as the heat far below the surface found its way up through cracks and holes.
Wispy curls of smoke wafted up in lazy spirals from the surface of the boiling pools, a pungent thick fog draping itself suffocatingly across the tips of the grass as the marsh buzzed and simmered with the acrid scent of decay. The air was dense and humid, expanding hot and unbreathable within ones very lungs.
The urge to cover his mouth and nose was fierce and instinctive, his eyes watering as he squinted through the gloom, barely resisting the urge to curl into himself and gag on the nearly poisonous fumes.
His ears still rang faintly with the harsh warnings thrown at him from the safety of the village he’d left behind not too long before. But even the sharp prick of fear he’d felt as pair after pair of eyes darkened and shuttered faded slowly to nothing more than an odd sense of detachment. The uncomfortable press of unease as time and life stopped. His form so lonely, small and frail, as he hovered on the edge of the mire.
Here the earth itself had turned predator, as dangerous and enthralling as a sleeping creature, steam hissing lazily from its bowels. As if the marshy ground, gutted and wounded by gaping pit holes filled with rotten water, was breathing, thick and wet and hungry. It breathed and it sighed. And it waited.
Waited for the foolish or unwary to attempt to navigate through, for a rash or brave soul to take a single misstep, to stumble into a final murky embrace of death. It wheezed and gurgled as it lay in wait. Wait for prey. Wait for him.
And he waited with it.
He waited for something only spoken of in old wives tales and fabled stories woven through the mysterious history of the land. For something of magic and miracles. For promises of the impossible. He wait for the stars to fall. For the stars to fall, and for his wish to be granted.
It was here that they said it happened. In the least likely spot, in a place where death and rot lay crusted and mottled on the surface of ground that lay like torn skin with wide open sores. Broken putrid ground. Where no beauty or life remained. Yet the only place in the world that those majestic unreachable stars dropped towards the waiting earth below. A place where stars could be caught if one could navigate the treacherous swamp and capture one before it was lost to the bog.
They said a single star was more than enough to change a man’s life, one was enough to change the world if he so wished. In exchange for catching one, a man had the power to ask for anything his heart desired, could ask for riches or knowledge, could ask for secrets no one but the silent observing stars knew. The possibilities were limitless, and nothing was more covetous than the promise of one’s deepest wishes being granted.
But he wasn’t here for simple material things, he didn’t care to gain things he couldn’t properly protect should others then attempt to steal his fortune away from him. No. He’d already had too many things forcibly taken from him in his short life. He had lost so much. Lost something most precious to him. And it was the only thing he wanted with his whole heart. It was why he was here, to dare, to cast himself forward and beg for a miracle.
If the legends were true, he would do whatever it took, risk his life and disregard all warnings, if only he could catch a single star. A star that could give him his lost self back. The half of himself he loved more than life itself, the soulmate that had been ripped cruelly away as they were split and lost to unknown ends of the earth.
The unbearable ache, the empty hollowness of living alone and heartbroken, a half to a whole, a half he didn’t want to be if it meant separation forever. A shadow of a soul as he was constantly plagued by an insatiable longing, a grating sense of incompletion. An incurable sickly heart, as the feeble organ struggled to support him on what little strength it had. A man with nothing left to live for if the stories proved false and he couldn’t get a wish here tonight.
Broken and desperate, there was nothing he wanted more, nothing he wouldn’t try to be reunited and complete at last.
Big dark eyes searched the fog smeared sky for any sign of the stars. Ears strained to hear some indication of their approach over the oozing sound of foul muddy water.
He almost didn’t believe his eyes the moment the first streak of white-blue light cut through the velvet night sky so far above. A glittering ball that crackled and danced across air as it descended, twirling and rolling as if running upon the wind. Falling down towards the marsh, and he watched it with baited breath and his heart pounding in his throat.
So far away, even as it drew nearer, shooting out across the endless expanse of swamp illuminating gloomy greens and browns, much too fast and far for a small human like him to even hope of running to catch it before it met the ground. He watched with disbelieving awe as hardly had it passed out of sight than two more brilliant sparks appeared and fell down after it from amidst the vast infinite blackness.
His body trembled, awash with growing excitement that was a tangled ball of nerves in the pit of his stomach. His mind consciously resisting the knowledge that he had to step foot in the toxic swamp to even have the slimmest chance of getting a star, because he knew he was risking his life to try and get something that might not even be possible.
He could fail to avoid one of those sickly churning pools that would suck him down, down and devour him alive. He could catch his star only to be burned alive by its intensely hot flames. He could get his star and make a wish only to find the stories to be false and all of it come to nothing. He could get his wish, only to find that it wasn’t what he’d really wanted.
Nothing was certain, everything rested on chance and miracles, but as the sky brightened to a deep royal blue as it was lit by countless stars arcing down before him like fireworks, he felt that they were calling for him. That this was where he would end everything, that this would bring him final rest and peace, acceptance, or if it were bestowed upon him, a fulfilling miracle.
So he took his first step into the springy wet grass that lined the edge of the dangerous waters, oppressive hot sticky air wrapping around him with each step. One eye on his path and one on the sky alight with glittering sparkling light, and his heart thundered in his ears like a drum. Urging him on, faster, faster, and filling him with an unshakeable sense of urgency. Time suddenly had begun ticking again, and he was already countless paces deep into the wilderness of the swamp.
He didn’t know how far he had come or where he was going, only focused on the stars that now rained down around him on all sides. None close enough to reach, but he could see more clearly now. Could see the way they tumbled helplessly through the air with nothing to slow their fall but greedy water that leaped from its bed to catch them, smothering their gleaming light with mud, strangling their clear bell like voices with acid that fizzled and ate away at them until they gave up at last and slowly drowned, sinking quietly beneath the surface.
He could see now. In a rotten swamp awash with light, the way the ground convulsed and buckled, stars splashing and dotting its surface, gleaming fiercely as they fought its hold, the whole place alive with the shrill cries of the stars as they collided, the discordant rumbling whispers as they struggled to free themselves, and failed. Every single one of them.
It struck something deep within him. That something wasn’t quite right...that something infinitely more dangerous than he’d imagined was lurking in the place that glittered beautifully surreal around him now.
Another flash of brightness drew his attention, and he turned back to the sky above. It was so far away at first, coming swiftly closer like all the others, before it began to fall faster and steeper. Right towards him. Closer than any before, brighter and larger than any star he’d yet seen. It whistled through the air as it seared the navy sky burnt gold. Crackling fire a streaming tail flaring behind it. Aiming for where he stood stiffly as if turned to stone.
A star, his star, it was coming for him. And regardless of if he died here in the swamp or died in the flaming embrace of his star, one last surge of desperate hope burst in his chest, pushing him into action.
He staggered as he tore his feet heavily from where they’d been ensnared in weeds, stumbling over uneven footing and craggy roots, half splashing through puddles that sucked eagerly at his feet. He barely paid attention to his path now, merely trying to keep his footing as his eyes were blinded by the brilliance of the approaching comet.
Stretching his arms preemptively in supplication, breath catching in his throat and heartbeat constricting his chest, he pushed himself fearlessly on. He reached up, body arching, hoping and begging with all that he had for it to be just enough, to be able to intercept it in its final sail towards the ground.
Spinning, tumbling, falling and falling, closer and closer. Arms thrown out and up to receive it. A flash of heat above, waves of air rippling with warmth too hot to bear, blindingly brilliant, sparking stars in his eyes and turning the world before him white. Something searing hot brushed his fingertips a second before he tripped, one foot plunging knee deep into the mud, thrown heavily to his stomach with a bone crushing thud that knocked the wind out of him.
Laying stunned in the wet grass, he gasped and coughed for air as his star passed out of his reach. Dismay pierced through the numb pain that shook his body, watching in disbelief as the star shot to the ground like a fire dart, not three paces away from where he’d fallen.
Lightning sparked on the surrounding plants, all much too saturated with water and mud to catch fire. His arms stretched feebly towards it, just barely out of his reach. Unable to move quick enough, just too far to save it, but close enough to see.
To see the dancing sprite in the heated center of the star, white sparks of eyes glittering at him, a fiery small form twisting and dancing out of control seconds before impacting. A spray of thick mud greeted its entry, sizzling water gushing as steam rose from the hot ball that sunk easily into its waiting embrace.
He watched transfixed, paralyzed with shock as the star screamed and wailed right before him, struggling and fighting the muddy hands that wrapped around it and devoured its brightness. Its fire snuffed out with a puff of white smoke, light fading as it died before his eyes. The shrill whistles lingering in the heavy air around him were the only remnants of perishing souls, as all the lights one by one slowly blinked out.
He scrambled on hands and knees, splashing through the mud, dragging his sodden heavy limbs through leaves that stung and rose fierce welts across pale white skin. Sweat drenched his body and matted his hair to his head as wide eyes filled with crystalline tears.
Denial, disbelief. Despair.
The pool he looked into frantically was rippling and churning, as if digesting a still weakly fighting prey. The dim husk of his star reflected pitifully through the murky water, and a dry sob tore brokenly from his parched throat.
He never should have come.
It wasn’t supposed to be like this. Not like this. Not when here, laying close to the ground, he could feel the earth rumble and heave, belching sickly up through layers far deep below him. Low moans and cries of tortured souls trapped and dying.
A graveyard of stars, a graveyard of dreams and wishes. And he was lost and alone in the center. He felt his will to continue wither and die along with the stars.
Because the next star that flew directly above him illuminated the eerily silent swirling pool at his feet. And a single more clear glance into its watery depths and he was stumbling back in horror. White bleached bones and rotting skin with hair still attached floating spread out under the water like a fan. Empty eye sockets that stared back at him from the realms of death. The skeletal grin on its face striking fear through him like a knife.
He turned from the sight, hobbling blindly away, feet catching on grass and slipping on mud, while around him the wails and screams increased in volume. Each hole that he passed now revealed another watery grave to unfortunate victims of the past, stars sinking down to join them in eternal rest.
The marsh was a living hell of death, and the reality of it struck him dumb, mind numb with incomprehension and blinded by the flashing brightness of the stars which continued to plummet towards their end around him.
He had to get out. Had to return to safety. Gasping and choking on air that was thick with the acrid smoke of doused stars and the wet fumes of the poisonous land that had killed them. Eyes darted frantically around to find the way back, to see the line of the forest he’d foolishly left behind as the stars mesmerized him and led him away from safety.
Nothing but swamp stretched around him on all sides, and panic set in with a vengeance. Frozen to the spot, unable to run for fear of sending himself even deeper into the cursed land. There was no way out. Nothing to do but watch helplessly as the beautiful innocence of the stars was murdered and slaughtered around him.
Endlessly long minutes of painfully wheezing the increasingly unbreathable air, not enough oxygen making his head feel light and spin dangerously. He swayed where he stood, feet already sinking ever so slowly into the springy wet soil now that he’d stopped. Hope of escape steadily slipped from his chest as he realized hollowly that he would still get his wish. He would be reunited with his missing loved one just as he’d dreamed of, but only through death.
Deeper and deeper into billowy waves of despondency, already giving up as his ankles were soon submerged in cold mud. He turned big blank eyes to the sky once more. There were fewer of them now, though the swamp still swarmed and buzzed with the deaths of the previous stars and imprisoned souls of the dead.
No longer did they glow beautifully in his eyes. They were burning and cascading helplessly to their deaths. The earth that should be bestowing life instead stealing it away, betraying everything he’d believed in as it desecrated something so infinitely beautiful and magical.
He shook his head slowly as a low plaintive cry drifted across the smokey battleground and curled around glistening stalks of the grass that clung to his wet legs and stung him with their poison. He didn’t want to listen anymore, terrified and repulsed by the thought that these sounds would be the last thing he ever heard.
Trying to distance himself from the present, he closed his eyes against the scene, pressing his hands over his ears in an attempt to block out everything. No more. He couldn’t bear it anymore.
But the sound came again, soft and urgent, almost panicked. And he thought his ears must be tricking him, a cry that sounded nearly human against the high pitched ringing of the stars, and it could only be the swamp trying to lure him deeper before it swallowed him as well.
The moaning cries rose and fell on the air, patching through green mist and half strangled by the more fierce screams of the stars. Soon it was melting into something like sobs, and he slowly opened his eyes. Unable to keep the sound from seeping into his head, spiraling down his spine and sinking fingers into his gut.
And he couldn’t resist the instinctive urge to find the person uttering such heartbreaking sounds. He couldn’t stop himself from sludging forward once more, following the trail of the sound, peering through the fog and relying on the fading lights to illuminate his way.
It grew louder as he slowly drew nearer, soft squelching grass and mud beneath his feet enough noise to alert the other of his approach, but the sobs didn’t cease nor falter. Another few paces and he cleared a patch of thick reedy grass, forcing his way through them even as they clawed and clung to him like hands. Tearing himself out of their grasp to the sting of their fingers marking his skin, he stumbled at last onto a small island of harder ground.
Blinking rapidly to clear his eyes, he was surprised to find a boy collapsed onto the ground before him. The other was curled into himself as if in pain, but as he took a cautious step forward, he saw him to be clasping his hands to his chest protectively, almost as if he were holding something.
His body shook and rocked as he cried weakly into the night, each breath ragged and breathy, as if every single sob pained him greatly.
He stood uncertainly for a while, merely watching, wringing his hands in indecision as the sad sound of the boy twisted his heart and called for him to do something.
He took a tentative step closer, legs shaking as the effort of forcing himself through mud and water began to take its toll. One hand stretched out carefully in a gentle placating gesture.
“A-are...you okay?”
The boy’s trembling body suddenly went still at the sound of his voice. He paused where he was still a step away, but by just leaning forward a little more he would be able to reach out to touch him.
Slowly, the boy raised his head as if it were impossibly heavy. Big brown eyes lifted up to meet his gaze, glistening tear tracks running down his cheeks, but the light in them was dull. Dull and blank, as if he’d seen the horrors of the world, and he knew as well that there was nothing more horrible than watching the stars die before your very eyes.
The boy stared at him soullessly, body twitching and curling reflexively as shuddering breaths still racked his form, tears slowly dripping from his eyes as his hands clenched more insistently against his chest. And his eyes dropped down to look more closely.
His lips parted, eyes widening as he stared. It couldn’t be...had this boy actually caught one?
Unconsciously he took another step closer to the other, dropping to his knees before him, stunned and confused. His brain was unable to catch up, couldn’t fathom why the other was in such distress when he’d been so lucky to actually catch one. The odds were all against them, and he had been certain the task was nearly impossible until now. His heart raced with excitement and he leaned closer almost eagerly.
That was until he saw the blood. And his stomach dropped out nauseatingly in one horrible swooping moment.
The boy’s hands were smeared and covered with it, thick and darkly black-red against pale skin in the faint light, running down his forearms and staining his clothes. Flecks of it were splattered across his chest and face, as if what he now held safely in his hands had exploded its life out on him. And it couldn’t be.
He couldn’t move, couldn’t speak, eyes flickering between the empty lost face and the bloody mess cradled to his chest, mind gone blank with the assumption of what had happened. With the realization that the stars all died regardless of where they fell. And the mark they left on those lucky enough, unfortunate enough, to catch them seemed drastically unfair.
His heart was breaking as he continued to stare helplessly at the sight before him, wishing he could deny what he was seeing. Wishing he could undo it or change it as tears of regret blurred his vision. He wished he never had come here to witness such sadness and destruction.
But as the broken cries of the other slowly calmed to irregular sharp intakes of air, he lifted his gaze back to his face, blinking rapidly to try and clear the water from his eyes.
The other was looking at him now, soft doe eyes focusing and clearing as he stared almost as if in awe. Like he couldn’t believe there was suddenly someone before him now, like he couldn’t believe that it was him of all people to have found him. He didn’t know why the look made his heart skip a beat, the light sparking deep in those eyes making him feel as if he were something special, as if he wasn’t just another person but one of the stars.
He swallowed thickly, searching the boy’s face for answers he was too cowardly and afraid to ask, but the other was suddenly opening his mouth to speak.
“...It’s you...”
Nothing more than a low whisper of wonder, an answer to a question, as if he had been waiting for him, impossible as it was, waiting and hoping and wishing, and that finally his wish had been granted.
He looked at him in incomprehension, brow furrowing slightly as the strange tightness of his chest made it hard to breathe. Did this boy know him? And why was he still looking at him like that?
“W-what?” He asked stupidly, voice soft and hesitant, hardly louder than the sound of the marsh still frothing and steaming just behind the stirring grass.
“I wished...” He leaned forward slightly as he spoke, eyes shinning with the light of someone who believed, someone who still dreamed. “I wished on this star.” Long fingers curled ever so slightly around the precious object clasped in his hands.
He didn’t know what to think. It looked as if the other had gone crazy, lost to the reality of having blood on his hands. It would explain why he could still possibly claim the dying star had granted his wish. It just couldn’t be possible. He knew it was not possible. But he wished with all his heart that maybe it just was.
And he had to ask. “What did you wish for?”
The other took a long slow shuddering breath before his lips slowly curved into a smile, lovely and in love and his eyes were glowing, dancing, and in that moment he was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen. More beautiful than the stars that streaked the sky behind him, and he ached and longed for him even before he heard the answer. An answer his loudly beating heart had known before he could even consciously comprehend it.
“I wished...for love.”
Sinking into his chest like warm honey, echoes and strains of a long ago forgotten whisper. A voice he felt he should know, a face he felt he’d been missing. And a soul that could only be his. Theirs.
“I wished for you.”
And it was too unbearably perfect. Too much for him to believe it was really here happening to him. The half he had lost, the soulmate that had been stolen from him before he even knew he had lost him, had called for him first. He had searched and found him first.
New hot tears pricked behind his eyes as he stared at the other in wonder, in apology, in happiness, and his heart was pounding fiercely as if it were trying to leap from his chest and pour endless love onto the perfect being before him.
“I wished for you.” A slight strain to that sweet voice as emotion clouded and deepened it, ringing beautiful with undoubted certainty. He reached a hand out before he even knew what he was doing to brush fingers across the warm tears that once more rolled down pale cheeks. Unable to fight back his own tears, and his fingertips tingled with amazement as the reality and warmth of the other breathed across his skin. “And here you are.”
And then his soulmate was opening his hands, dropping them from his chest and revealing what lay fragile and precious in his two palms. Ruby red drops still rolled from it slowly as with each faint beat the heart within the safety of those hands shivered and pulsed its remaining life into the world.
It was too small and broken, nothing more than a half of what it should be, of what it once was before, of what it could finally become again as the responding leap of his own heart in his chest was more than enough answer. As if it could recognize the small dying piece as part of its own. As if it anticipated being reunited once more.
It was all he could do to just trust his heart, follow its urgent command to repair what had been broken. And as he looked from the faintly beating heart to the glowing eyes of his other half, he knew there was nothing he wanted more in the whole entire world.
At last he had found him. They would finally be complete. And his hands trembled uncontrollably as he reached to cup them around the other’s. Warmth seeped through the touch, and he could feel nothing but each fading weak thud that seemed to shake the air, the very earth around them.
He lifted his eyes from their joined hands, to seek out those big trusting eyes. The ones that were soft and deep with so much love. “You wished for the both of us.” He whispered at last, fingers tightening around the other’s as he moved forward.
All the gratitude and happy disbelief pouring from eyes that caressed a face more beloved than all treasures. Years of longing and heartache from a crippling separation was finally coming to an end, and all at once a love and bliss he’d never felt before washed over his entire being as they leaned into each other.
Joined hands pressed between their chests as their lips met softly to seal them as one. Light bloomed out from between fingers that interlaced around a heart that now came to life and beat as one, spilling its life and heat into two sides now clasped so closely together.
Never to be undone again as two halves of a split heart melted back into one inseparable conjoined whole, binding and sealing in a truth that would last forever. Kisses broken by smiles as warm hands curled around cold ones, a low husky chuckle answered by a musical laugh, and the light of falling stars dimmed before the radiance that was their happiness.
Perfection was found hand in hand, with traces of love dancing on their lips.
A new light was born that was all their own.
So they opened their eyes and they lived.
*~