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They lie still in the disheveled bed, naked bodies sprawled next to each other and sides pressed together despite how hot it is. And gods, it is hot, even for Axel. The air becomes stifling with how hot and sticky it is with the heavy scent of sex and maybe a hint of something long since forgotten. Axel doesn’t know; he doesn’t know much these days, and maybe that’s the whole problem, he thinks as he stares at the ceiling, idly twisting a few locks of Saix’s long hair with his fingers. He doesn’t know what this is anymore, what they are anymore, doesn’t know how much of Isa is still left in Saix, doesn’t know if any of this can be repaired, or if he even wants to repair it.
But that doesn’t stop him from keeping an arm around Saix, more possessive than he would care to admit. Saix doesn’t usually stay after sex, and Axel wants to make sure that he doesn’t leave.
He doesn’t know why he feels this way. Maybe because keeping Saix close helps him pretend that everything is okay, or because Saix was (is) love, and this is the closest that Axel can get to love, to any emotion anymore, isn’t it? If so, he’ll keep Saix pressed close for now, even if it means pretending that this odd relationship has any meaning and is not an empty and shallow shell, just like themselves.
“Hey,” Axel says at last, because the silence is becoming too much for him.
Saix gives a long sigh, and Axel just grins. Saix never did like it when Axel was chatty after sex, or in general, actually. Axel likes that Saix doesn’t like that, if only because that trait is a remnant of Isa. It reminds Axel that some of Isa does live on in Saix, if only a little.
Knowing that Saix won’t respond, Axel takes it upon himself to fill in the silence again. “Do you know how a star dies?”
There is a pause before Saix shuffles, turning his head to give Axel a hard look. “Do you know how to be quiet?”
“No, listen,” Axel interjects, needing Saix to listen, to talk with him as if they are Isa and Lea again, tangled up with one another in Isa’s bed, trying to be quiet and not wake up his parents in the next room.
“Stars heat up over time, and that causes them to expand. They get hotter and hotter, and some stars, well, they get fucking gigantic. When one of those star gets to be like a billion degrees, it collapses on itself and dies in a fiery explosion, destroying everything in its path.”
Saix is still, and Axel turns his head too, meeting Saix’s gaze with a grin that is three-fourths wicked and one-fourth pained. “I think we’re stars, Isa.”
Saix snorts, turning onto his side to completely face Axel. “That would imply we are real.”
Axel’s grin doesn’t falter, but he thinks something inside of him does. He closes his eyes. “Are we not real?”
He doesn’t want to see Saix’s face when he hears the next word. “No.”
Opening his eyes and staring into an amber gaze, empty and cold and unfeeling and un-Isa, Axel agrees. He laughs in response, but he doesn’t know why. Another ‘why’ to add to his ever-growing list.
Saix moves forward with a hum, hands trailing over Axel’s collarbone and chest, lips hungrily ghosting over Axel’s neck. Axel shifts closer until he can feel Saix’s erection pressed against his hip, and yeah, Saix is ready to go another round, just like Isa always had a carnal streak to him – another remnant of Isa, one that Axel approves of indeed.
They kiss messily, lips and tongues and low sounds of desire and approval. The kiss starts slow at first, almost lazy, but becomes more and more intense, until Axel feels light-headed and like he’s floating. Axel threads his fingers in Saix’s hair when they finally pull back for air, and he smiles again in spite of himself.
“We’re gonna burn out, you and me,” he says, and when did his voice get so rough?
Saix has the gall to almost smile – Axel can see it in his eyes, in the little way his lips quirk just slightly, probably too subtly for anyone else but him to notice – and promptly crawls forward until he’s completely atop Axel, their bare erections brushing together and leaving Axel choking back a sound.
“And take down everyone in our path?” Saix asks, stroking Axel’s thighs in slow circles.
For once, Axel doesn’t reply, simply grins and rolls his hips into Saix’s until they’re both biting back sounds of want. He doesn’t reply because he knows that Saix is right, that they will destroy each other and probably so many others in their violent, burning death, but Axel can’t do anything to stop it, to change it, so might as well go with the ride, right? Which is why he shifts and wraps his legs around Saix’s waist, and he’s already still prepared from the last time, so he takes Saix’s still-slick cock with ease.
They fuck like it’s their last time together, Saix keeping a rough pace that Axel matches with each roll of his hips. Saix’s hands and nails dig into Axel’s shoulders, keeping him pinned as he’s fucked thoroughly into the mattress with each hard, deep stroke. The air becomes far too hot again, and Axel can barely breathe, and when he sees the look on Saix’s face – predatory and wanting with pupils blown and eyes murky with lust and maybe something else – Axel can’t breathe at all. The pace is too fast, too punishing to last for long, and Axel’s head tips back as the pleasure consumes him and he comes so hard that he thinks he sees stars.
Sees stars dying.
Sees himself and Saix dying.
Saix comes with a growl, his thrusts uneven and shuddering, and slowly, slowly pulls out and returns to his place by Axel’s tired side.
Again, they lie still, naked bodies sweaty in the sticky heat. Axel wraps an arm around Saix just as before, allowing him to pretend that this is normal, that they’re not spelling out their own doom with their heat and their not-real relationship and coupling.
When Axel finally drifts off to sleep, he dreams of fire, of explosions and chaos and then –
nothing.