maybe we got lost in transition (and were never found)
maybe we got lost in transition (and were never found); donghae/sungmin | g | ~2900w
sci-fi!au | they're stuck in a time warp with no way to get out.
they were always meant to be a science experiment, anyway. even from the beginning, when donghae had excitedly dragged sungmin to the research labs, lured there by the promises of quick fast cash and the prestige of being the first humans to experience the magnificence of time travel. now, when sungmin thinks back on those foolish days of naivete and innocence, he can’t help but wish that they had been smarter, had held themselves back a little bit to consider the various implications and risks they’d been stupid enough to take.
it had all started with that poster, really, flashing on the large LCD screens of each and every electronic store in the city. it was the year 2086, and the world was more advanced than it had ever been. seoul was right at the heart of the recent technological wave and frenzy, conveniently reclaiming its position as one of the world’s top research and development areas. but what the world didn’t know was that not only had the south korean scientists been mass-churning out the newest phones and tablet models, but they had also been looking into a way to jump back and forth in time. to go all the way back into the past and hurl themselves all the way into the future. it had been an impossible dream only seventy years ago, but now it was a highly plausible reality. after all, who wouldn’t want the chance to revisit old memories, to linger in the foregone melancholy and bittersweetness of a time long gone, or the chance to correct past mistakes and make things right? now, since the scientists had already successfully created a sort of machine to make this dream come true, all they needed were test subjects. and what better way to attract these test subjects than to dangle bait in front of them, leading them straight to the figurative rat trap?
now, with fingernails broken and worn down from scratching on unbreakable glass and vocal chords torn from days of endless screaming, the two of them realise they should have known better. when things are too good to be true, they normally are.
☆
“sungmin-hyung, sungmin-hyung,” donghae comes running up to him after school one day, just like any other day. sungmin’s just gotten released from his chemistry class, whereas donghae, who ends lessons fifteen minutes earlier than he does, loiters around the school gates waiting for him just so they can go home together. “come on with me, you’ve got to see this.” sungmin just nods and lets donghae pull him along, because it’s impossible to say no to donghae when he gets this excited. plus, sungmin’s always had a small soft spot for donghae and his innocent smiles, almost childlike in quality, but soft and mellow, like gentle sunshine after rain. and so he follows along, trailing slightly in donghae’s overexcited wake.
sungmin can easily see the shine in donghae's eyes whenever he walks past the countless posters and advertisements pasted everywhere. they're only a few months shy of eighteen, which is the legal age for signups, but it's as if donghae desperately can't wait to be a part of this new, amazing invention called time travel. "imagine all the things we could do if this machine actually worked," he says.
"just think about it! we could be here today, in the 1900s tomorrow, and in the 30th century the day after! we could see so many things, and it would only take the push of a button and a few minutes. isn't that cool?"
"yeah, but what if this technology isn't foolproof? what if we get abandoned somewhere because the machine screws up?" sungmin always has to be the voice of reason and logic, the one who always has the most reservations and is constantly regarded by donghae as a "party-pooper". sungmin just prefers the term "level-headed". on the other hand, donghae has always been the dreamer, the boy with his head up in the clouds. it's been that way ever since they were small children, when they would lie on the pristine green lawn of donghae's house and gaze at the stars, talking about anything and everything.
"today in geography we learnt about the stratosphere and the way the sky is split into different levels. someday i want to take a hot-air balloon and fly all the way up, to infinity and beyond."
"don't you ever wonder about the stars up there? wouldn't it be great if one day we could just board a spaceship, get up and go? we'd fly by asteroids and planets and comets and we'd be there amongst the stars. maybe we'd look down and we'd see earth, just a mass of blue and white and green. wouldn't that be cool?"
but the thing is that childish dreams are just that - dreams, fantasies, things that die off slowly as maturity sets in. even big dreamers like donghae have to set feet on the ground someday, so sungmin isn't really worried about donghae's most recent farfetched scheme. it'll die off soon, he thinks. it always does.
☆
little does sungmin expect donghae to drag him to the research labs that wintry october day. he still remembers all the tiny, insignificant details of that life-changing day; time and memory have a quirky way of collaborating just to make sure you never forget. it was chilly, but not cold enough for snow to fall (not that snow ever fell anymore in seoul, anyway. globalization and modernization had screwed up their weather patterns entirely), and donghae was in that fluffy down jacket of his, buffered and protected from the chill that was slowly but surely seeping into their bones.
"i thought you weren't serious. c'mon, donghae, this is stupid. let's go home."
"come on, live a little. dare to take risks. besides, we might not even get chosen, you know?"
perhaps it's the part about living which truly convinces sungmin to give it a try. deep down, he's always had a sense of wanderlust, the desire to go and never come back. yet it's been so deeply buried under responsibilities and the rigid stereotypes their korean society seems to have had since the beginning of time; he thinks he might just have lost this desire, lost it as a child and never reclaimed it. screw it, he thinks. dare to live a little.
shrugging, sungmin takes donghae's proffered hand and they step into the clinically detached-looking building together.
☆
murphy’s law; they make it in. they get chosen and sungmin doesn’t understand why because he’s sure there are plenty of other better-qualified people out there, people who want it more than he does. but he takes a glance at donghae’s bright smile, all teeth, and he decides he doesn’t really mind because really, what can go wrong?
(this is where he makes his first mistake; everything can go wrong when humans play about with things they don’t understand or cannot control).
☆
sungmin pretends he doesn’t notice the tiny scrap of paper donghae keeps in his wallet, crossing off the sunrises and sunsets to the day where he can finally experience time travel. sometimes donghae blurts out seemingly random numbers - (‘46’. ‘45’. ‘44’.) and sungmin knows that he’s counting down to d-day. 46 more days, 45 more days, 44 more days. “you’re such a child sometimes,” he says to donghae fondly, and donghae blushes and smiles and pretends to deny it.
“i’m not,” donghae protests, but sungmin just looks at him with one eyebrow raised and donghae relents. “okay, fine, maybe sometimes. can you blame me though, i’m just excited.”
sungmin laughs. “of course not, you big baby. you still have 44 more days, though, have fun waiting it out.”
donghae’s only reply is a petulant “hmph”, a soft exhalation of air that resounds in the comfortable silence of the room, and as sungmin watches his heart flops a little bit and he tells it to quieten down because donghae has been his friend of ten years and honestly, he doesn’t want to jeopardize their relationship by making any risky moves.
☆
things happen in the twenty-odd days which they spend counting down to d-day. on d-20 snow falls and donghae rushes into sungmin’s room, shouting excitedly as his limbs flail excitedly everywhere.
“it’s snowing, it really is!”
sungmin is still groggy and slightly grumpy from being yanked out from his nest of comfortable blankets, but it is donghae who is smiling ever so happily and sungmin finds that he cannot be mad for long, if he was even mad in the first place. however, due to the fact that it is (he squints blearily at the bedside clock) 7.36 in the early morning, his ears don’t quite function properly and he can’t exactly summon up any enthusiasm to coddle donghae with.
“what?”
“i said,” donghae pouts, “that it’s snowing.”
it takes all of five seconds for sungmin to process this statement, eyes widening and mouth falling open, all thoughts of slumber gone. jumping out of bed, he dashes to the window, and there he sees soft white flakes drifting down, blanketing the ground in a soft, thin layer of frozen crystals.
“come on, let’s go dig out our old winter jackets!”
the day flies by in a maze of snow wars and hot chocolate and snow angels. when he thinks back to that day sungmin thinks that he will only ever remember melting snow and cheeks flushed from cold, lips and fingers chapped and dry from the blustering winds that whip your hair around your face and freeze the tips of your ears.
that day was a joy to spend with donghae and it doesn't matter how much time passes, because it's something the two of them will always regard as their own personal miracle, a memory set in the winter but cheery and warm enough to belong in the summertime.
☆
if he were to be completely honest with himself sungmin would not say that the winter day was the true miracle, but rather what happened a few days after that. the snow had melted and faded as fast as it had fallen, but rather than brooding over the freak weather changes, donghae and sungmin had merely remained curled up at home, each left to his own devices. donghae was watching the rain run down the windowpanes, tracing the trails of water with his finger and dreaming once more, dreaming larger than life; sungmin was curled up on the sofa, reading one of those books he’d bought a few years back in a mass book-buying spree but had never found the time to read. he wasn’t really paying much attention to donghae, which would explain why the notorious man-child suddenly came over and pressed himself closer, all while whining, “sungmin, sungmin, pay attention to me.”
“that’s hyung to you,” sungmin muttered absently, but honestly, he doesn’t really mind. they’ve been friends for so long that the suffix is merely a word tacked on when donghae feels particularly respectful, but he wouldn’t say it’s a requirement or formality; they’re past that stage, way closer than that. “what do you want now, hm?”
sungmin can just see donghae’s pout out of the corner of his eye. “for you to look at me, duh.”
“mmmm.” sungmin murmurs absently, too absorbed in the protagonist’s dilemma to really pay attention to donghae. (a small part of his mind wonders why they always end up like this; why is donghae always demanding for his attention? and he can only conclude that donghae is, in essence, a child, needing warmth and security 24/7.)
what sungmin expects is for donghae to drag him off the couch and demand that they play videogames or go shopping or maybe even drop by their friend hyukjae’s cafe to say hi. what sungmin does not expect is the slight pressure of chapped lips on his cheek, lingering almost shyly (and sungmin nearly snorts and ruins the moment because donghae is never, ever shy), as if afraid of rejection.
the instinctive thing to do, of course, is to pull donghae closer and press his lips on his forehead, right below his hairline, the kiss equally as tentative as the one donghae had given him.
somewhere in a little corner of his mind, sungmin notes the date (d-10) and smiles. but right now, it’s just the two of them, pressed into and snuggled up in a corner of the couch, arms around each other as if to block out everything the world can throw at them. no words are needed, no “i love you”s are exchanged, because that would break the peaceful silence that they’ve painstakingly built up. besides, there’s no need to repeat something you already know, and sungmin can see it from the way donghae’s eyes are shining at him that donghae really, really likes him, maybe even loves him with all his heart.
☆
d-day comes with surprising speed. the days spent counting down were spent in a sort of tranquility, feeling as if time was suspended in honey, all languid and lazy but at the same time rushing by like a bullet train, too fast for them to catch. they spent the ten days in anticipation, slight on sungmin’s part but over-excessively for donghae; the night before he almost couldn’t fall asleep due to his immense excitement. if he were to be honest, sungmin had nearly forgotten about it, treating it as if it were any normal day. after all, that’s what the scientists had told them - it’ll only take a minute, you’ll be zipped back to the past and back here before you know it. don’t worry, nothing will go wrong, we’ve tried it out before with lab rats and they always came back fine. they’ve even collected their commission already, stored away at the bottom of their respective beds in a safety deposit box.
they enter the time capsule, hands linked, fingers slotting neatly through each other. the two of them aren’t exactly tall and neither do they possess especially long limbs, so it isn’t as much of a tight fit as they had originally speculated it would be. sungmin looks over at donghae, and he looks thrilled; he’s running his hands over the smooth surface of the walls, wanting to touch and feel and remember every single thing about this precious moment before it ends. catching his eye, sungmin mouths the three words ‘i love you’, and donghae winks and says the exact same thing. it’s more of a reassurance this time around, providing comfort that no matter what happens, the two of them will be alright, because they’re together and they have each other.
“no matter what happens, we have each other, right?”
“yes. forever and always.”
that’s all they have time (ironic, isn’t it, that time keeps making an appearance in his thoughts again and again) to say before the scientists press the button.
“5, 4, 3, 2, 1. see you in a minute.”
zoom.
there’s a flash and the feeling of hurtling forward so fast, sungmin almost feels like he’s freefalling. it’s rather unpleasant, and not at all like those thrill rides he’d taken before at amusement parks; this feeling is almost as if somebody had reached deep into him and ripped out all of his vital organs in a sole, swift movement. he feels a slight pressure on his hand, almost as if donghae is saying, don’t worry, you still have me, i’m here and sungmin breathes deeply, trying to relax himself.
slowly, he opens his eyes, and with a rising sense of dread he realises that something is terribly, horribly wrong. they seem to be stuck in limbo, because all around their surroundings are white. no colour, no black, just white, as if they’re paper dolls stuck on a sheet of paper and made to stand. time is the fourth dimension, but it isn't a flat plane - it's a land full of bumps and slopes, ever-changing and shifting. just their luck they happen to be stuck in a little wormhole, trapped in one of the folds of the carpet of time. they don't know what's happening outside of their little time capsule; they could be walking out of the research labs even now, hundreds of dollars richer and happier, drunk off the exhilaration of having successfully time travelled, but that only applies to their future selves, the ones lucky enough to have escaped this. at present the lee donghae and lee sungmin of now are stuck here, with no way to return, for eternity.
sungmin realises the moment the truth dawns on donghae, because his face falls in horror and probably the realisation that the first dream he’s dared to pursue has collapsed and sunken in on him, castles of air built in the sand. the thing is, he’ll never get another chance to chase down any more lucrative dreams, because he’s stuck here, for now and for eternity, trapped in this quagmire of the vicious venus flytrap of time.
“you know, when i wished for forever and always with you, this wasn’t really what i had in mind.”
“i know. believe me, i know.”
end