Broken Wings
This is a birthday fic for my beloved unnie omgorgasm, have a terrrific birthday bb, I love you so fucking much <3
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Broken Wings
There were distant sounds of explosions and gunfire, sounds of destruction and death. The streets outside are empty and devoid of all signs of the usual bustling activity, the street vendors and little children running around just months ago now only a fading memory. Hankyung sees the flashes of light and flickering red in the distance, past the hills and through the trees perched on top. It had not reached them, not yet.
He had waited for this day for a long time, ever since news of the war first broke out. For that look to be on that face, for those eyes to hold that plea. In a way, he had been glad when the accident had happened when it did, the careless mistake of someone not cleaning up the water and one wrong step that sent Hankyung crashing to earth, like a bird with his wings suddenly broken. He watches the stage- his stage, the bandages tight around his ankles and Hankyung hadn’t even cared, because it had kept Seunghyun here with him.
But when the echoes of violence finally drew too close, when Hankyung could start to move again, there wasn’t anything to hold Seunghyun back anymore. They don’t say anything to each other, because Hankyung can’t bring himself to say anything that doesn’t sound like a plea to not leave and he knows he can’t do that. Seunghyun never denies him anything, but he would this time, even if it hurts him to refuse Hankyung. And Hankyung would never put his lover in pain, not even if he has to hurt in silence himself. He is fighting the tears though as Seunghyun takes his hands, rubbing gentle circles into Hankung’s palm and all he can do is bite down hard on his lips to silence the sobs as he is pulled into a hard embrace.
Seunghyun doesn’t say anything either, because he can’t make fake promises when the truth is that nobody knows what’s going to happen out there, not when there has already been so many lost. There’s a promise to return safely in those dark, intense eyes, one that is swirling in those depth, but unvoiced. Hankyung brushes a hand across sharp cheekbones that already felt more hollow and along that strong brow, smoothing out the small frown with a caress. Hankyung is brought back to other times, filled with laughter or uneven breathing or simply staring into each other’s eyes as they played and loved and shared. Hankyung is still caught in his memories when his lover presses a desperate, solid kiss to his lips and is gone before he has time to reach out and grab the sleeve of the soldier uniform.
His bones heal and the deathly fireworks fade, until Hankyung can barely hear the endless rain of bullets beyond the hills. The shadows grow taller and he hears the whisper of death instead, soft gasps of pain, the choke of nausea, sobs of hopelessness muttered into his ear. He sees a world of red, painted with the life of his friends and of falling bodies each time he closes his eyes. Hankyung’s not there on the battlefields, he’s here in his little house-their little house- with pastel blue walls and the curtains they had hung up together, but he might as well have been. He sees anything that happens, feels everything; he’s right there when Seunghyun is grazed by a bullet saving a boy from his battalion, feels the sharp sting across the left cheek and sees the clench of those jaws and the pain that flits through determined eyes. Hankyung’s sitting beside Seunghyun in the ditch at night, wet and bloody and exhausted, but still watchful, eyes blinking away the tears mixed in with the sweat and cradling those large hands in his, soothing the soft tremors away as they try to ignore the flies swarming around them.
Hankyung is right there, he must have been, because he wakes up each morning hurting and scared and shaking, curled into a tight ball and there’s even blood on him sometimes, smeared across the pillows, deep crescent carved into his palms. Hankyung dreads going to bed each night, yet he forces himself to, because he wants to be beside his lover and because he knows Seunghyun needs him there too. And no matter how bad it is on the battlefields of his nightmares, Hankyung takes comfort in knowing that Seunghyun is still alive, still able to come back to him one day. He must be alive, because Hankyung still was.
He wakes up one day and he isn’t curled up or shaking. He lies still, unmoving, barely breathing because even that took effort and he is too tired to do anything, not even to stop the tears flowing freely from his eyes (Seunghyun hated when he cried). All Hankyung can see is that one moment when the look in those wise, weary breathtaking eyes change from the determination to come home to him, to apologies and finality and regret. That one moment as pursed, cracked lips part and curve into a ghost of a smile, even as the light fades on the day and in that lingering gaze. Hankyung doesn’t do anything, can’t do anything, just lies there, broken and with no one to piece him together again.
When the sun rises on a land of red ash and ivory bones the next morning, the war is over and the people searching for the injured among the dead, comes across a man with strong eyebrows and a scar across his left cheekbone. And the tiny bird with broken wings cradled in his hand.
//
seunghyun= T.O.P for those who don't know <3
*****************************************
Broken Wings
There were distant sounds of explosions and gunfire, sounds of destruction and death. The streets outside are empty and devoid of all signs of the usual bustling activity, the street vendors and little children running around just months ago now only a fading memory. Hankyung sees the flashes of light and flickering red in the distance, past the hills and through the trees perched on top. It had not reached them, not yet.
He had waited for this day for a long time, ever since news of the war first broke out. For that look to be on that face, for those eyes to hold that plea. In a way, he had been glad when the accident had happened when it did, the careless mistake of someone not cleaning up the water and one wrong step that sent Hankyung crashing to earth, like a bird with his wings suddenly broken. He watches the stage- his stage, the bandages tight around his ankles and Hankyung hadn’t even cared, because it had kept Seunghyun here with him.
But when the echoes of violence finally drew too close, when Hankyung could start to move again, there wasn’t anything to hold Seunghyun back anymore. They don’t say anything to each other, because Hankyung can’t bring himself to say anything that doesn’t sound like a plea to not leave and he knows he can’t do that. Seunghyun never denies him anything, but he would this time, even if it hurts him to refuse Hankyung. And Hankyung would never put his lover in pain, not even if he has to hurt in silence himself. He is fighting the tears though as Seunghyun takes his hands, rubbing gentle circles into Hankung’s palm and all he can do is bite down hard on his lips to silence the sobs as he is pulled into a hard embrace.
Seunghyun doesn’t say anything either, because he can’t make fake promises when the truth is that nobody knows what’s going to happen out there, not when there has already been so many lost. There’s a promise to return safely in those dark, intense eyes, one that is swirling in those depth, but unvoiced. Hankyung brushes a hand across sharp cheekbones that already felt more hollow and along that strong brow, smoothing out the small frown with a caress. Hankyung is brought back to other times, filled with laughter or uneven breathing or simply staring into each other’s eyes as they played and loved and shared. Hankyung is still caught in his memories when his lover presses a desperate, solid kiss to his lips and is gone before he has time to reach out and grab the sleeve of the soldier uniform.
His bones heal and the deathly fireworks fade, until Hankyung can barely hear the endless rain of bullets beyond the hills. The shadows grow taller and he hears the whisper of death instead, soft gasps of pain, the choke of nausea, sobs of hopelessness muttered into his ear. He sees a world of red, painted with the life of his friends and of falling bodies each time he closes his eyes. Hankyung’s not there on the battlefields, he’s here in his little house-their little house- with pastel blue walls and the curtains they had hung up together, but he might as well have been. He sees anything that happens, feels everything; he’s right there when Seunghyun is grazed by a bullet saving a boy from his battalion, feels the sharp sting across the left cheek and sees the clench of those jaws and the pain that flits through determined eyes. Hankyung’s sitting beside Seunghyun in the ditch at night, wet and bloody and exhausted, but still watchful, eyes blinking away the tears mixed in with the sweat and cradling those large hands in his, soothing the soft tremors away as they try to ignore the flies swarming around them.
Hankyung is right there, he must have been, because he wakes up each morning hurting and scared and shaking, curled into a tight ball and there’s even blood on him sometimes, smeared across the pillows, deep crescent carved into his palms. Hankyung dreads going to bed each night, yet he forces himself to, because he wants to be beside his lover and because he knows Seunghyun needs him there too. And no matter how bad it is on the battlefields of his nightmares, Hankyung takes comfort in knowing that Seunghyun is still alive, still able to come back to him one day. He must be alive, because Hankyung still was.
He wakes up one day and he isn’t curled up or shaking. He lies still, unmoving, barely breathing because even that took effort and he is too tired to do anything, not even to stop the tears flowing freely from his eyes (Seunghyun hated when he cried). All Hankyung can see is that one moment when the look in those wise, weary breathtaking eyes change from the determination to come home to him, to apologies and finality and regret. That one moment as pursed, cracked lips part and curve into a ghost of a smile, even as the light fades on the day and in that lingering gaze. Hankyung doesn’t do anything, can’t do anything, just lies there, broken and with no one to piece him together again.
When the sun rises on a land of red ash and ivory bones the next morning, the war is over and the people searching for the injured among the dead, comes across a man with strong eyebrows and a scar across his left cheekbone. And the tiny bird with broken wings cradled in his hand.
//
seunghyun= T.O.P for those who don't know <3