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Breeches are opening all across the world, admitting people randomly from other Earths.
Beomgyu hits the concrete shoulder-first. The force sends him tumbling into a half-somersault, a desperate attempt to mitigate the pain as he rolls to a halt. For a few moments he can only lie there, heaving in quick, short breaths, stunned blind by impact. Nothing registering behind the white bursts in his vision and the explosive drums of his heartbeat. It’s fine. It’s just another day—get back up, crawl to safety, check your surroundings. The watch on his wrist beeps: Earth-913.
At the edge of the roof, he hauls himself upright into a seated position. His earpiece must’ve fallen out during the jump, which was much more finicky than normal. Through the lightheaded fog of adrenaline the pain hasn’t fully formed yet, and Beomgyu’s dreading the moment it hits. Soobin has warned him that the gravity is delicate this time, this universe half-ripped open from the anomaly’s tearing, but the supposedly saving grace was that Taehyun and Huening Kai’s watch device should have been enough to hold it off and give them some time.
In theory it’s supposed to be a simple task, as simple as a Commission job can be, anyway. There’s a weird anomaly that’s been twisting two timelines’ branches together, and Beomgyu needs to find where the variance is before they completely crash into one. Target, and eliminate if necessary—not more, or less blood that must be shed to make sure events that are supposed to happen, happen; people that aren’t supposed to stay, not stay.
He should have known better than to space jump when the timelines are so tangled up together.
A shuffle, and Beomgyu’s head snaps up. A definite sound of footsteps approaching. It’s deliberate—someone wants to signal their presence, either in reassurance or threat. Beomgyu fumbles for the gun tucked into his thigh-strap, hissing at the contact against the raw scrapes on his palms. Wildly he heaves the weapon up with both hands, just in time for a figure he knows all too well to emerge from the lightless mouth of the emergency staircase.
“I thought I heard something up here,” Yeonjun calls. He takes a few more steps forward, a leisurely pace, and the light falls upon him like a veil. “It’s been a while, Viken.”
As always, Choi Yeonjun looks untouched by mortality, characteristic combination of constant space jumping and the lack of human remorse for the type of work he tends to take on. And the handsomeness. Somehow it still manages to scratch at Beomgyu’s walls every time. The first time he sees Yeonjun it was through the scope of a sniper rifle. Edges of the lens warping, a shifty frame on a screen. Yeonjun’s mouth was moving but there was no sound—his sharp eyes sparkled but they didn’t seem alive. He wore a suit and a tie, delicate fingers wrapped around the stem of a wine glass like it’s the throat of a lover. Not enough to bruise, but possessive all the same. The liquid, can be the colour of blood; someone’s life, can be held so carefully in those beautiful hands. It has been unsettling back then when they were something and it still turns Beomgyu’s stomach now, the living awareness of the disparity in their strength. Now, Yeonjun comes to stop a few paces away from him, an amused curl to his mouth as his eyes roam over his body, and Beomgyu feels himself bristle amidst the pain.
“Daniel,” Beomgyu trains the gun to Yeonjun’s head, and presses himself harder to the wall. “What the hell are you doing here?”
Whistling, and not without mocking, Yeonjun puts his hands up, though they both know it’s never been a surrendering gesture with Yeonjun. “That’s not fair. I’m unarmed, little bird.”
“Never stopped you before,” Beomgyu says. The strength it takes to keep his voice and gun steady has his vision shimmering and splitting, parallax error. “Why are you here, Yeonjun-hyung?”
Yeonjun hums, smile stretching unnervingly wide. “Same thing you’re here for, B.”
“Well you’re late.” Beomgyu scoffs, dropping his gun. Bad move. It strains against his ribs, definitely bruised, possibly cracked. “They’re gone.” He says, and it chokes out into a cough.
“Hmm,” Yeonjun says. “Ribs?” and then suddenly he’s in front of him, kneeling over Beomgyu, the distance between their bodies going to zero like an overstretched elastic band snapping back into place. The slant of Yeonjun’s shoulder blocks out the light.
The past…time, Beomgyu has almost forgotten what it feels like to be near Yeonjun. Now having Yeonjun in his space again overwhelms. For a moment his mouth goes arid and his body forgets to hold its tautness just enough for Yeonjun to brace one hand against the wall by his head and places the other against the side of his face. Scalding shock of Yeonjun’s palm to his skin, icy cold slipping through the surface like water, Beomgyu feels his face burn against it.
Back to the wall, there’s nowhere left to retreat. He sighs, closing his eyes, and Yeonjun’s hand comes up to move the matted strands away from his face.
“Don’t,” Beomgyu says lowly. “Don’t touch me.”
“You’re hurt pretty badly, babe.” Yeonjun says, all mock and no joke. “You won’t be going anywhere in this state.” Beomgyu’s splintering focus catches on the glint of teeth in his smile. “I could help.”
“I’d rather die.”
A pout. “Don’t you trust me?”
“That’s not the point,” Beomgyu snarls. He needs to get up. He needs to move but he’s shaking—his hands are shaking, and he feels fear, real true honest to god fear, gripping at the cage of his heart, worming into the chamber where his soul is. “You’re supposed to be dead,” he says.
Yeonjun looks down at him from above, grinning, the devil himself on Earth.
“Then you’re in hell with me.”
♾️
It’s warm when he wakes up. Warm and dark, the background soundtrack of cars down the streets and chatter in English echoes from the balcony besides his. He’s lying on his side on the bed and the stars are out, the drapes of the room blowing in the night breeze like the wedding dress of a runaway bride.
When Beomgyu moves he realizes he’s covered in bandages, wrapped around his middle. Sticky, not quite dried, pressing against his ribs when he tries to sit up. Music drifting up from below. Shadows on the balustrade.
The bathroom light flips on, and Yeonjun leans against the doorway. “Good. You’re awake.”
Beomgyu swings his legs from bed. “How long was I out?”
“A few hours.”
Yeonjun offers, and moves to stand in front of the mirror. He’s back in a suit now, black Dior tie flat against the white of his perfectly pressed shirt as he adjusts his cufflinks.
Beomgyu looks at him from the corner. “How long are you staying?”
“Same as you.” Yeonjun says, and turns around. “Until the variance is found.”
It’s unstated, but it’s there. The Commission works the same in all universes. Beomgyu works for the Earth–553 Commission, Yeonjun the –943 one. They were never supposed to cross paths, but missions happened.
Yeonjun happened.
Another swipe of his hair back, and Yeonjun is approaching again, an amble pace. He stops a few feet in front of Beomgyu, and the grin blooming across his face is still as audacious and pulling as the first time.
“Shall we?”
♾️
The first time they meet, Yeonjun tattoos his hands around his neck.
“Nice to finally see you,” Yeonjun says, as he pins him to the wall of an alleyway in Taiwan. It’s summer and the whole place is a swamp—filled with mosquitos and stinking, putrid sewer. There’s smears of bloody handprints and scrapes of a struggle on the concrete wall—trails of a target Yeonjun’s Commission wants dead. Trails of a target that Beomgyu’s Commission wants alive. Yeonjun’s fingers wrap around Beomgyu’s windpipe and adrenaline courses through him, a drug injected straight to his heart that makes its pace quicken. “Do you know me?”
“No,” Beomgyu says. It’s a lie. Yeonjun’s eyes are bright, and they burn, and Beomgyu should take the opportunity to get away but Yeonjun looks so enthralling—poised to pounce like a tiger in the dark—that he can’t help but be captivated, even as pinpricks of white dot at the edges of his vision.
“That’s a shame,” Yeonjun says. His grip slackens, then he slams Beomgyu to the wall again, muscles bulging under his tight vest. “Because I know you.”
Beomgyu does know him. Every universe has its rules. And Yeonjun comes from one with orders to kill. No mishap. No mercy.
He jumps. Slippery as sand through his fingers, ingrained in Beomgyu’s memory, shifting and iridescent. Only evidence he has left of Choi Yeonjun is just a choker of bruises, a shortness of breath, and a pressure against the husk of his heart that he cannot identify. Not yet, then.
It doesn’t take long for Beomgyu to jump, too.
♾️
In the present, they blend into the party like chameleons to a tree. Yeonjun in his Dior suit, Beomgyu in his Armani one. It’s all shiny dresses and champagne glasses, and the light is pale golden, flecking off Yeonjun’s black hair like glitter.
"Upper floor," Yeonjun murmurs. "Second door to the left." His breath is hot against the shell of Beomgyu's ear and he presses a hand to Beomgyu’s lower back for extra effect, causing the corner of Beomgyu’s mouth to twitch. Beomgyu snorts, following the line of the curved banister, along the upper gallery of the oversized classic mansion, through the crowd of partygoers to one of dozens of plain brown doors.
“Why?”
“Secret research lab.”
“Great.”
Yeonjun squeezes a hand to his back once more and they separate, weaving through the throng of the crowd. Beomgyu trains his eyes to the marble as he slides into a seat at the bar, tapping at the holoscreen to order a glass of wine. Red. It’s a familiar notion: Beomgyu keeps an eye out while Yeonjun collects information, just some data retrieval and sometimes, an assassination. Red. The blood would crust dry and flaky between Yeonjun’s nails that he never seems able to scrub off completely.
He's had three drinks and turned four people down by the time Yeonjun returns—a curve to his lips, a speck of something dark on the pristine white fabric of his sleeves.
"They’re not here.” He says, loosening his tie with one hand as he slides in the seat next to Beomgyu’s. There’s a forlorn look in his gaze, like he’s disappointed. Beomgyu has always known Yeonjun’s a creature of war—born of will and a burning desire to achieve victory above all else.
"Did you at least find a clue?" Beomgyu teases.
Yeonjun leans over to press a deep kiss to his lips, raising a hand to cup his jaw and hold him steady, showing off just how much of his tongue is in Beomgyu's mouth. Possessive. Greedy. A flame lights in Beomgyu's gut. Oh, he'll remember this later—everyone's eyes on him as he lets out a little moan as they part.
"I did," Yeonjun says when he releases him, patting his cheek and giving him a grin, his eyes sliding over the man perched in the chair beside Beomgyu, who’s gaping bug-eyed at them. "You clear here?" he murmurs.
Beomgyu has the code for the mansion’s electronic lock on the microchip in his wristwatch and he's broken a few hearts—as far as he's concerned, he's done. Whatever Yeonjun has committed would come to fruition later. "Yeah, let's go."
♾️
The door’s surface is cold, but Yeonjun’s a hot, heaving mess behind him, draped across his back and his erection against his ass. He’s fumbling with Beomgyu’s pants, shucked halfway down his thighs, but the opened belt buckle keeps knocking against the wood and if someone walks past right now, Beomgyu knows they’ll no doubt hear the clanking and thumping rebounding off the closet space.
Never stopped them before.
“Shit,” Yeonjun rasps against his nape, and the way his breath hitches makes Beomgyu press his forehead harder against the door, an instinctive arch of his back. Back to Yeonjun. “Fuck, you feel so good.”
Beomgyu laughs in reply, relief overcoming him at the confirmation that it’s not all in his head—that Yeonjun still wants him as much as he does, that Yeonjun seems as desperate to kiss and fuck him as Beomgyu has been for the past time. He throws an arm back to wind around Yeonjun’s neck to bring them closer, fisting into the ends of Yeonjun’s distressingly dashing swept up hair, causing him to groan.
“God, Gyu-yah.” If Yeonjun is trying to sound angry, he’s failing badly at it. “Damn you.”
Beomgyu doesn’t even get the time to attempt a witty response as Yeonjun also tugs his head back by the hair, pressing his lips to the column of Beomgyu’s throat, nosing up and down in a way that’s just shy of ticklish. A breathy chuckle escapes him when Beomgyu makes a noise of complaint, his breath warm and wet against the sensitive skin of Beomgyu’s neck, and then Yeonjun starts sinking teeth in the hollow of his collarbones.
“Ah,” Beomgyu breathes, trying to control his sounds and not succeeding much. “No marks. We—we talked about this.”
“Ugh,” Yeonjun moves his head to where the base of Beomgyu’s neck meets his shoulder. He briefly nips him there before soothing the wound with his tongue. “Fine. But I know you’ll look so pretty with the shape of my mouth on you.”
“Fuck.” Beomgyu curses, closing his eyes at the mental image. He’s never had a love bite before Yeonjun because it seems unprofessional and juvenile to have it, carry it on him. But somehow having Yeonjun’s marks is thrilling. Just having Yeonjun’s mouth on him, licking and biting and sucking, sends blood down south.
It’s all that fucking matters. There’s a possessiveness in Yeonjun’s touch, a hunger in Beomgyu’s gut, the wave surging inside him comes with a breath stolen. He turns around and captures Yeonjun’s mouth with his own, fisting hands into the collar of Yeonjun’s vest.
It’s always the best when it’s like this. Beomgyu isn’t base enough to say that this line of work makes him horny (it doesn’t—it’s the thrill, the adrenaline between jumps), but he is base enough to say there’s a high in his veins when it comes to doing it with Yeonjun. When it comes to the way Yeonjun’s eyes shine when he watches him work. The two of them together at a party like this, all eyes on them, feeling the gaze of so many people on him.
Here, in this closet space, a miniscule hole in the vast expanse of all universe, Yeonjun fucks him against the door from behind. Beomgyu can taste iron in his mouth—iron and liquor—something hot and burning, like swallowing a flame. Yeonjun is desperate too—his touch frantic and his breathing rough, the way he pushes Beomgyu against the door is frantic. Every press of his fingertips to Beomgyu’s still tender ribs feels like it might just break right through and reach into his heart, pounding as wildly as he is.
There’s no moment of truth, no staring into each other’s eyes as Yeonjun pounds into him. Just something visceral, evocative, a surging heat. Yeonjun wraps around him and kisses him and Beomgyu doesn’t just see it—he can feel it. There’s a bracelet of bruises around Yeonjun’s wrist and he knows it must be from that time when Yeonjun jumped too hard, too far from the coordination he was supposed to travel to and Beomgyu hadn’t been able to see him again since until—
Yeonjun pistons into him and pleasure lances right through his guts. Now, the rip has brought Yeonjun back and even if it’s not the Earth he belongs to Beomgyu would still let Yeonjun ruin him—he’ll burn up like a rocket re-entering the atmosphere, just to have him over and over again. Tattoo Yeonjun’s name onto his heart, feel the grip of bones beneath Yeonjun’s hands.
♾️
The first time Yeonjun kissed him is in the shower of a hotel suite in Chicago. Blood caked on his knuckles, bruised skin wet against the cold tiles. Pressing him to the wall, steam rising around them. Yeonjun is fully clothed and his white shirt goes see through, exposing his dark nipples, all the hard lines of his muscles like the ridges of mountains on a map. A cartographer’s work of art, soaked in water that sluices down them both; red wine on Beomgyu’s lips, sticky from Yeonjun’s.
Yeonjun fits his fist around Beomgyu’s dick, slick, hot, wet. He presses an open kiss to his lips, licking into his mouth, and Beomgyu tries not to whimper his name when he comes. Like it’s a chant. A prayer.
Because Yeonjun will always answer.
♾️
They board a plane to Tokyo together—not spatial jump—because they’re still in this split universe and the work is not yet done. Yeonjun takes the window seat, and he’s quiet, except his hand that keeps tangling with Beomgyu’s and not letting go, holding it to his thigh. Beomgyu allows it, solely for the fact that he hasn’t seen Yeonjun in months (in his time), and he doesn’t know when they’ll have this again, if ever.
The multiverse tradeoff. Endless space and time for your life in its shackles.
But—he stares down at their hands intertwined together. Even with a million lightyears between them, Yeonjun’s the only one who understands him in a way that can’t be put into words. The one who can pin him down with his hands tied behind his back. The one who can hold him to his chest without a word. Yeonjun knows what he tastes like, what he sounds like. How to make his eyes roll back as he gets fingerfucked against the wall of a fancy hotel suite. How he looks wearing only a gold necklace; only the Commission’s watch.
There's something intrinsic about the two of them in this line of work that's so rare. They're something that shouldn't work, but they do—twin disasters colliding into the most brilliant lightshow the universe might ever see.
“Where were you?” he asks. Start slow.
Yeonjun stops fiddling with their fingers, and looks up at him, gaze steady. “Space jumping. What else could I be doing?”
“Is that all?”
“Always.”
There’s a tone in his voice—Beomgyu can read in the smile, can read the gunpowder in his words. His slim fingers smooth across the back of Beomgyu’s hand, and he can’t help but shiver, because there’s conviction in Yeonjun’s words. He knows something.
♾️
Nothing in the job has said, kiss the other universe’s agent. Or do everything you can to make the agent smile, because he looks so, so sad when he thinks nobody is watching. Or even, tell another universe’s agent you love him, before you kill him.
Beomgyu’s never lived by the rules, anyway.
♾️
The research lab Yeonjun dug in leads to an abandoned facility in Shibuya. It’s empty when they get there, but the hard look in Yeonjun’s eyes tells him that’s all he ever needs. Beomgyu feels his temper flare, and wraps a hand around Yeonjun’s wrist, just above where the bruises stay.
“Enough flip flopping around, Yeonjun-hyung.” He says gravely, and watches Yeonjun turn back to him. No less steady than he was before Beomgyu topples his balance with his vice grip. “What are you really hiding from me?”
Yeonjun winces. Because even with lightyears of agency strapped under his belt he is just as breakable as Beomgyu is, possibly even more so. “I can’t explain yet. It’s still unclear.”
“Then make it clear.”
“It’s not that simple, Beoms.”
“When is it ever?”
Beomgyu replies, and reaches over, gripping Yeonjun both by the arms to make him face him. Yeonjun’s face hovers over his, lovely and cruel and vulnerable, because he knows just as well as Beomgyu does that Yeonjun’s capitulation is a conclusion, all the steps before pre-planned and well-acted. It’s only a matter of the tipping point between pride and desperation. Beomgyu swallows, and steels himself. “You missed that jump. Why?”
Yeonjun’s never missed. Earth-943 has more advanced and high-functional tech, even a rookie agent can jump to the right coordinate with the Commission watch’s laser accuracy. They’re spies, and in the grand calculations of the multiverse, they must be perfect. But also because Beomgyu just knows him. To Yeonjun, mistake sits out of place like a still heart, dislodged and vulnerable outside of the ribcage.
It’s because of that that Beomgyu has recognised it so unmistakenably that day: in the way Yeonjun looks at him as the watch is switched on. In himself, racing underneath his skin with every pulse. Love or duty, love or duty, the coin flipping through the air in a copper arc, its edge catching on the light. See you, Gyu-yah, Yeonjun has said, as the portal crackled in the air and then he was gone. Gone. And Beomgyu has thought he’d never see him again.
But here, Yeonjun just breathes: “It wasn’t a miss,” and kisses him.
♾️
There’s heat corkscrewing all through him, sparks exploding in his mouth. Yeonjun’s lips are like an iron brand on him and Beomgyu wants to melt—he wants to be turned inside out and filled until Yeonjun is all that he can remember.
Yeonjun pants against his mouth, backing him up until his legs hit the mattress—until they’re crashing together. Fingers scrambling to pull off clothes, kisses with too much teeth. A tangle of limbs and bodies and the two of them rutting against each other—a thunderstorm, a bolt of lightning bursting as it crashes into the earth.
He thinks this is the best thing about him and Yeonjun. The wild glint in his eyes, the curve of his smile. Pale city lights flowing across his skin and something alien in his blood and his stupidly big ears twitch as he takes Beomgyu apart: stripping him down and pining him to the bed, kissing him, touching him, wrapping his hand around him and pulling out all the sounds he can from Beomgyu’s lungs. His teeth like the point of a knife against his throat and Beomgyu arches into him, gasping his name.
Sometimes they play games—cat and dog. Sometimes Beomgyu pins Yeonjun to the floor and teases him until his name is the only language Yeonjun knows. Sometimes he’s immobilized, the prettiest little thing for Yeonjun to play with. A predator in the jaws of an apex predator.
There’s no place for those games here. This is raw, and wild. Yeonjun works Beomgyu open, thumbing at a bruise on the inside of his thigh over his pants, Beomgyu blinking at him through the matted strands of his hair.
“Let me touch you,” he whispers, and Yeonjun's eyes go dark and hungry.
“Strip,” he orders hoarsely, sitting back on his heels and dragging his shirt up over his head. Beomgyu does the same as quickly as he can, because Yeonjun is lean and a little tanned and perfectly muscled, every daydream he’s ever had brought to life and enhanced upon. He strips off his shirt and wriggles out of his pants, a move that makes Yeonjun growl and shove his own pants down with little finesse. Then Yeonjun is on him again, one hand twisting in Beomgyu's long hair and tugging sharply. It makes Beomgyu arch his back, and Yeonjun steals the cry right from his lips.
“Fuck,” Yeonjun whispers, words warm and humid against his cheek. “You don’t know how long I’ve—”
“I do,” Beomgyu gasps back, because he’s been waiting, too (in hope, in vain), raking his short nails down Yeonjun's back and adoring the way he grunts and twists.
For a moment, everything morphs like a kaleidoscope lens turning, a space getting pulled taut. There is sweat in Yeonjun’s eyes, precome on his hands, lube on Beomgyu’s skin. Seconds pass to minutes, hours, and then Beomgyu is ready, and Yeonjun is pushing inside him, and they gasp in tandem, fireworks set off through their spines.
Yeonjun stays still for a moment, overwhelmed by heat and tightness and Beomgyu, and then Beomgyu pants out, “Move,” so he does.
The world could end, right then and there, and Yeonjun doesn’t think he would have cared.
“Shit,” Beomgyu grunts, tipping his head back. “D-Don’t stop.”
“Never.”
There’s a growl against his shoulder blade, low and deadly enough to make Beomgyu’s skin prickle. Yeonjun slides all the way home, thrusts into Beomgyu with short, harsh jerks of his hips that punch the breath right out of Beomgyu’s chest as each one explodes through him, as fierce as pain. Those sharp teeth catch his mouth, and Beomgyu kisses back just as hurriedly, can't tell if the saliva in his mouth is Yeonjun’s or his own or both.
With another growl, lower, deeper, Yeonjun pulls away, pressing wet lips to Beomgyu’s throat. “You wanted this,” he reminds Beomgyu, like a threat. “You’ll always want me, won’t you?”
Beomgyu moans in reply, because they both know it’s a yes, it’ll always be a yes, wobbled in his mouth as Yeonjun hits just the right angle for his toes to curl back against the backs of Yeonjun’s thighs. His lips trail lower, teeth out, marking indents on Beomgyu’s throat and chest like a map of stars. Some of them will probably scar, and Beomgyu isn't about to object. He groans, tries to pull Yeonjun closer with his legs, but Yeonjun catches his thigh and shoves it wider, giving three hard thrusts that drive a shattered cry from Beomgyu’s throat. There's a hand around his cock, squeezing tight, and Beomgyu’s heart locks in his throat. He can't even make a sound, just comes, and it feels like being battered by a hurricane; the force of it tearing through him like a hole in the sky, hot iron pressed against his skin.
Yeonjun isn’t done, gasping and biting down on the hollow of his throat, telling Beomgyu how good he feels, because Beomgyu has always known. He does. To reach through what is considered the limitless expanse of space and have someone this way. To be able to have Yeonjun like this—to be able to make him feel like this. His back crisscrossed with the half-moons of Beomgyu’s nails like a cluster of galaxies, as if Yeonjun can be the universe himself. They crash together, like an atomic collision.
♾️
It’s not much later when Beomgyu opens his eyes. Sunrise paints the sky peach orange above the arches and columns of buildings outside the window.
Yeonjun is sitting on the bed, holding Beomgyu’s sniper rifle, weighing it in one hand, the other running his fingers over the grooves, tracing over all the places Beomgyu’s hands have been.
“What if there’s a middle point?”
Beomgyu stirs in the blanket, and shifts to his side to face him. “What are you talking about?”
“It’s a tunnel,” Yeonjun starts. “From mine to yours, and vice versa. Same to every universe. It’s like a subway train.”
“...So?”
“We don’t have to meet at the stop.”
♾️
It’s snowing when they return to the rooftop. Thick, cold flurries falling over them like ashes of a city on fire, like the apocalypse has arrived. Like a phoenix has risen, bursting its way out of the underworld to emerge for rebirth.
Beomgyu shivers. He did not dress for the occasion, but so didn’t Yeonjun, but he doesn’t seem to mind. He steps over the ledge, and for a fleeting moment it’s dejavu, Beomgyu thinks he’s going to see Yeonjun jump, once again, sucked into the abyss of lights like the death of a star. The buildings start splitting, and Beomgyu takes a breath.
“It was you, wasn’t it?” Beomgyu asks. He wants to sob when Yeonjun answers—because it's a confirmation that it’s real. He’s real and he’s alive, and he’s the anomaly that breaks the multiverse in half. The beginning and end of it all.
“I’m sorry Beomgyu.”
“Why?”
Yeonjun is quiet for so long that, between the steady rhythm of his breathing and the constant thunderous motion of the sky tearing above them, Beomgyu wonders if he’s blanked out without realising it. The moment dilates to a standstill, the way everything always moves strangely in a broken timeline. Infinitely prolonged.
“Because,” Yeonjun says. The sound distant, as though heard from very far away, despite the little space between their bodies. “I’ll always look for you, no matter where.”
It’s why he jumped. Not to another universe, but into the intersection between all of them. Anything to find the promise land where they can stay without defying the laws of space and time.
“You have a part of me,” he says, splaying a palm flat against Beomgyu’s heart. “I have a part of you.” He lifts his hand and steps away, all the warmth lacking from the day plain on his face, and nobody has ever looked at Beomgyu like that, or ever will be able to. “I’ll be waiting.”
Yeonjun switches the watch on, and the portal warps open, tearing a hole in the ledge below them.
Beomgyu wishes he could kiss him one more time. Wishes this wasn’t it. They can’t walk out of here. The multiverse will always catch up, bounding them to their respective places like a red threat of fate.
“See you in the jump, babe.”
Yeonjun says anyway, eyes like the stars. The endearment comes out all wrong from his grin—too much of a meaning, too little of a tease. The encroachment of the tunnel opens up. And the vicious light behind Beomgyu’s eyes cuts off like a power outage.
The world turns on its axis.
♾️
Beomgyu wakes up in 553.
”Nice work.”
He turns, and Soobin is there. Poised and proper in his Commission suit, dark strands falling over his eyes, and there’s a small glint in his gaze. He knows something, too.
”The variance?”
”Gone.” Beomgyu says, and it’s the truth.
“Hmm.”
Soobin nods, and it’s all the acknowledgment Beomgyu gets as he swivels on his heels and makes way to the door. Beomgyu stares after him, and is only slightly surprised when Soobin pauses at the threshold, and chances a look back at him.
“Are you okay, B?”
Beomgyu allows himself to smile this time. Face solemn and alight with intent. “I will be,” he promises.
“Good.”
Soobin chuckles, and reaches for the handle. It would have been it, if his gaze didn’t linger a second longer before he shuts the door close. Beomgyu follows his eyes. Back to the watch on his wrist, blinking to life.
A jump to 943.