fic: it starts with his heart

[rurusayshi]

it starts with his heart

minsung | lee know / han jisung | 9,6k | rated: e | completed
tags: alternate universe - cyberpunk, cyborg lee minho | lee know, pirate han jisung | han, angst, porn with feelings, but it's actually a farewell because one of them is dying, a lot of kissing, body worship, to say goodbye, breathplay, dead dove: do not eat, blood and violence, hurt no comfort, sex worker lee minho | lee know, established relationship, guilt, alternate ending, bittersweet, anal sex, unhealthy coping mechanisms
 

fic under the cut

The constant, muffled hum of noise that permeates the dusty, cobblestone streets masks the quiet sound of Minho’s soft exhalation as Jisung presses him against the wall covered with torn posters and moss grown regime, his hands tightly gripping the older’s thin fabric of sheer shirt. The heady smell of sweat and sex hangs heavy in the air, amidst the usual sea salt and rotten food that defines Paletown.

“I understand what you're probably thinking about me, about us ." Minho's voice is a soft murmur, and he delicately nudges him away with the grace of his left arm. He doesn’t dare use his right. “But it's best if you stay away from me, Jisung.” 

Jisung, however, remains as an unmoving rock, resembling those imposing and colossal metal structures sieged right next to the grand entrance of Station Fortuna. 

“ Jisung ,” Minho warns him. The younger is persistent, stubborn. “What I've become — I don't want to hurt you."

“Can you though?” Jisung whispers but each syllable is heavy and burdened with desperation. With regret.

“Not now,” The remaining shimmer of a pained smile curves the nightdancer’s lips upward, his voice grave. “Not yet. But I will.”

As if to prove his point, he raises his right arm with a flourish, striking the wall behind with a potent impact, the metallic sound echoes carrying the weight of his fate. His skin, still, delicate, soft and velvety, adorned with marks far too less for a commonfolk to bear, is a foul blanket, covering something sinister, something less human. 

“See?” He says. “It’s already been decided for me.” Minho has no choice, nor a chance to twist what lays ahead. The nightdancer finds himself trapped within a cage woven from the delicate threads of his own betraying flesh. First his heart, now as whole.

“There must be a way, Channie hyung and I—“ 

“ Jisungie ,” Minho brings left hand to the younger’s cheek and whispers. “It’s over.” 

But there is a way. 

His detested limb, his right arm , snakes behind him, bringing out yet another object clutched in its grasp. It’s Jisung’s gun; handcrafted ages ago with fine work. Its purple, flickering light pulses through the edges of dark, matte metal. It is beautiful in Minho’s hands. 

Jisung stops breathing. 

The fragile silence stretches into long seconds of the pirate’s gaze lingering on the gun, only to him abruptly snapping his head upward to lock eyes with the nightdancer, tears welling in the corners of his eyes. Jisung is not angry, Jisung is afraid. 

“No,” is his firm reply. “You can’t ask me to do that, I can’t — hyung there is no way I can…” Jisung’s voice cracks. This, they recognize, is the most humane of endings, that at least some part of Minho still remains within inside. 

His fingers dance over Jisung’s cheeks, capturing his tears and ending their descent. It’s his way of saying goodbye, silent yet loud enough. Jisung melts into his touch. “Then take me to your ship, and float away. Far far away.” 

“But you would die,” Jisung’s voice trembles. With each uttered word from Minho's mouth, he surrenders a portion of himself. “You would die, your heart… ” 

It starts with his heart. An artificially built one, that is, keeps him at bay, an anchor and a cage, chaining him to the soil he would rather spit. For his heart would falter within mere seconds if he travels away from the city’s walls, he is entrapped within this vivid, voracious world that leeches his soul, pillaging his dreams and swallowing him as whole. 

But he learned to love with this heart. With Jisung. 

“Why does it matter?” In his eyes, this is the merciful way. “There may be a place where you will welcome me for everything I am, yet there will always be me who is this, this monster , that our very lives battle against. I can’t let you see that, I can’t let you look at me and grow with bitterness, Jisung. I don’t want that.”

He doesn’t give Jisung a chance to speak. “Either this ,” Minho exhales, his eyes drawn once again to the gun. “Or you have to leave. For never to return.” 

“But I love you…” Jisung’s words well up and constrict his throat, like a crimson river flooding his mouth, staining the contours of his speech, tugging at his insides with a sharp, agonizing ache. “Hyung… What about my love ?” 

And it continues with a chip nestled within the depths of his brain. The intricate web of metallic surfaces engineered inside the sanctum of his right arm. They devour him from the inside, leaving his soul hollowed to be harvested and animated with no will at all. 

But he learned to love with this body. With Jisung.

“I know.” Pain flickers across Minho’s eyes, followed by sudden, mute fear and anger that freezes his expression with stiff tension. For six years, he heard the younger softly murmur those words to his ear. The pirate’s affection draped over his skin like a soft, protective blanket; it never haunted his heart until now. Nothing in this world prepared him for a farewell, not like this, never this. 

“Jisungie, love…” You would still remember me right? Everything inside of Minho collapses, like a star collapsing into an inverse of itself, pulling everything around it into darkness. Minho had never gazed upon a star, yet at times, his sweet Jisung referred to him as his guiding star. 

His left hand released from the younger's cheeks, finds its refuge within Jisung's grasp, their fingers interlocking as they journey towards the younger’s heart. “I’d be right here, never far away, always here and always here to love you.” 

Jisung starts sobbing.

Leaning forward, his head finds solace in the cradle of Minho's neck. Jisung holds onto him, desperate and cornered. From within him, then, an animalistic cry escapes, bearing the weight of all that is both sweet and bitter, painting a picture of a future forever fractured. 

Their future, their dreams, their hopes.

They took Minho away when he was distracted with a client. The gloomy distance swallowed the last dull thuds of the anodic beats of the club when the guy was fucking into him from behind. Seconds later, his senses danced in a maelstrom of kaleidoscopic colors before the veil of complete darkness descended, wrapping him in its quiet embrace. And in hours, Minho was chipped and he was one of them, a sentinel of Janus, a spy amongst the innocent, always watching and always reporting. A lie in disguise, waiting for his call with no future ahead.

The city lives , he remembers the teachings. The city is us, it is home. The city is home and forgiving only to those who surrender to be devoured, yet Minho was not. A danger then, a threat, is what he is but what the city creates, the city takes it back. 

It is disgusting, this place is.

It is disgusting, what he is. 

He stood heavy-hearted, for he had dared to chase dreams, dared to hold the hands of hope in this weary world. And he played the fool, for his hand extended toward another soul, painting both in the vibrant, chaotic hues of this wretched mess, for he dared to love.

It’s not my fault, a thought rebels. It’s not his fault.  

When he swallows the bile in his throat and when Jisung’s gun tumbles from his grasp, Minho leaves a kiss on his temple and cards his fingers through the younger’s hair. 

“I’m sorry,” he starts yet his own voice betrays him with a crack. “But don‘t let me be one of them, please. I can’t be like them .” 

Jisung’s words are muffled as they're mumbled into the fabric of his coat, interrupted by hiccups and sobs. The nightdancer is desperate to hear him, for it might be the last time and he is desperate to hide from him, for now he is ugly as an open wound oozing withered flower blossoms, painting everything they swore on with a sickening shade of pale grays. 

Instead, Minho kisses him. 

Minho drinks his sobs against his lips and drinks the salty taste of Jisung’s tears in his mouth. That’s Jisung, that’s his love and that’s his everything. Minho would love him any time, anywhere. 

The younger moves away, and blinks up at him, the street lights licking gold and rubies across his skin, eyes red and puffy, lip bitten through, swelling and bloody for it, hair clinging haphazardly to his cheeks and chin. His dark, wet eyes are in search of something. Maybe his words. Maybe his past. Maybe his breath. 

“I can’t say goodbye,” Jisung whispers, and it sounds like a roar in the silence of the night. “Not when I promised you so much.”

His left arm moves in accordance with his heart, gloved fingers twining with the conjured tears as if to brush them away from Minho’s eyes. The pirate is in agony and regret, loss and longing, but there is a constant, one undercurrent that remains though all the rest pools around them and seeps away. 

A love, bright and burning, bruised but not diminished. Jisung would never stop wearing his love. 

“Then tell me the ending,” His sudden need for such a ravenous feeling deep in his chest, hungering in silence, filled to the brim with such yearning, the nightdancer longs to hear how the story ends. The story that made his lone nights bearable, in avoidance of Jisung because he is in far lands and not with him, his sweet voice whispers him to sleep. “Were they still happy at the end?”

He brings Jisung’s gloved hands to the ear piece he is wearing and leans into it, his lips brushing the younger’s calloused skin. It was Jisung’s gift, to let Minho know he is safe, that death is far away. He made up a story about two lovers, soft sunlight painting their kitchen in yellow hues, kisses that curve into smiles, slowly floating in the sky and around the stars, a life without distances and shackles, one of peace.

“There was never an ending,” It is a confession, him scraping it out of his heart and laying it bare at the nightdancer’s feet. Forever , he doesn’t say but Minho hears it very well. 

His breath catches on the next inhale. But this is the ending , Minho thinks and says, “Jisung, can you… Can you kiss me more? ” 

Suddenly, it is the night they met. His cherished name dwells on the nightdancer’s lips, in the sanctuary of his heart, in the echoes of his body, in the chambers of his memories, and within the corridors of his thoughts. He thinks of Jisung in the bar; the way Minho moves in the throbbing ambience of lights and music, drawing the crowd along with him like it is nothing, yet only dancing for the pirate’s gaze, making sure his eyes never leave. It is the dark alley where Jisung drinks him like he is wine, his cheeks blush and bloom, and it is very new, so he just kisses him more to burn them along. 

The nightdancer is used to scents mingling with his body, hungry touches on his skin; a piece of him in a while, then another facet a little later, and a fresh breath upon his flesh. Afterall, a nightdancer is, nothing if not a bearer of sins, a perfect pleasure toy for anyone with enough coin to buy him with. Yet , amidst the hush of the night, beneath the street light's caress upon the obsidian ocean surface, and within the city's punctuated darkness, painted in hues of red, purple, blue and gold, that ache , that night with Jisung, lingers deep within and stains his body first, then his thoughts, because nothing stays the same ever again.

Jisung’s thumbs brush his cheeks, skimming gently his eyes where wetness is pooling. Then he is kissing Minho, cupping the older’s face as he leans in, again and again with a desperate hunger, savoring him with no intention to back away. Minho's arms entwine around Jisung's neck as he tilts his head in surrender, tasting the pirate's lower lip with a fervor that knows no bounds. He pulls Jisung closer by his hair, and in the back of his mind, where all his fears live, he muses on the possibility of a night stretching into an endless realm where they do nothing but kiss, kiss, and kiss.

They are silhouettes caught in a moment, timeless creatures suspended in amber and crimson, surviving on the burnt battlefield of a place once known as a city but now a vast abyss of their greatest nightmare.

When the younger’s hands wander low, fingertips tracing naked skin next to the remnants of his unbuttoned shirt down to his bare shoulders, Jisung stills and pulls away, staring at him, eyes following the fading yet fresh scars on his neck and collarbone and shoulders; he notices the ways in which Minho is exposed. “Hyung,” he dares, dragging the scraps of his composure together, gravity heavy on him. “Hyung, your shoulder —”

Minho pulls the collar of his shirt close and hushes him with his lips on him once again. He sucks the breath out of Jisung’s lungs till he is sweating, panting, shutting his worries and dark corners of his mind out. Then Jisung’s lips brush beneath his ears, and down his neck, so he takes one of his hands and brings it inside of his thin sheer shirt. “ No more talking. ” It’s a plea, urgent even. 

But Jisung is mostly obedient if it pleases Minho, so he listens. His impatience is generous when bit by bit, as though he has ingested the dancer named Minho, what little of him there is, is bared to him. He settles his gloveless hand low on the nightdancer’s waist and thumb feeling hipbones through his flushed skin, and mouth on his neck, like a teething animal , licking, kissing, biting whatever he is given desperately. When his nails dig and his teeth sink deeper, Minho opens his mouth to the wretched moan which finds its way from his throat, Jisung feeling the sensation under the touch of his lips before hearing it, drawing the sound from his lungs and giving it to Jisung in all its raw neediness. His ankles are hooked behind the younger, keeping him close to his body as tight as he can, but it is not enough. Minho craves for more. Minho always craved for more. 

“ More ,” Minho demands and grips him harder, neck bared, his body for Jisung to take. “ Please , I want to feel you Jisung.”

Jisung kisses his way down, a wet trail of his lips, his tongue, his words, his whispers of love shaping the body whimpering under him. It’s salty from a faint sheen of sweat on his skin and yet, there is something intoxicatingly sweet, familiar , like peaches and cherries, and honey and white flowers, it is Minho’s smell, Minho’s taste. A flavor that is only Minho. 

But it hurts . Jisung’s heart is ripped open and his flesh is in pieces, a wounded animal he is, bleeding, each drop of his crimson burning him, consuming him. It’s guilt. He feels guilty.

“Slap me,” is what leaves his parted mouth, lifting Minho up, pressing their bodies together, gazing upon his eyes, not daring to look away even for a second. “Bite my skin, dig your nails till I bleed, claw my eyes out ,” It is his prayer to the hollow ache in his core roaring with anger, with sorrow. “If I can’t be buried in you, then leave something of you within me.” 

There is little resistance to Jisung’s words when Minho’s left hand finds the pirate’s cheeks. His head whips to the side but it is weak. “Again,” Jisung growls but it is a sound that seldom visits the ears of the nightdancer. His gaze turned into the polished sheen of glass, pupils trembling in the dim of night, uneven breathing and looking up, Jisung snaps. “ Again ,” he says, forcefully, yet his gloved hand reaching out to intervene with Minho’s unguarded bare palm is gentle.

Then, that same hand strikes Jisung across the cheek. The pirate’s head snaps to the right, and he lets out a gasp, mouth falling open. Jisung asks for one more time, and there, Minho indulges him, each slap across the younger’s face leaves his skin red, his saliva wets Minho’s bare thighs and then there is blood. Minho’s soul stings. It is even worse when Jisung’s starts speaking. “Use your right hand,” It is a demand.

“ No ,” Minho loves Jisung’s cheeks. He loves it when they are soft under his palms, warm and pink when he blushes, warm and pink when his breathing is hard, warm and pink because that’s how Minho likes. “It would leave a scar Jisung, it would hurt you…”

“That’s what I hope,” Jisung presses his blood stained wet lips to the skin of Minho's right wrist, his voice sure and gentle. Then takes Minho’s index finger in his mouth, licks it, kisses it. “It will be a reminder.”

“A reminder of what?” That you ate his heart raw. The same blood oozing from Jisung’s nose is red on his left hand, trailing between his fingers, piercing his insides. “That I hurt you because I was weak? That I kept hurting you even after?”

The words do not make it. Instead, they hit a block in Jisung’s throat, careening into each other and finding vocalization in a strangled ball of sound. It is unsettling. Funny how they used to fuck their anger in and fuck their agony out.

“Is this really…” Minho is defeated but he tries, he will try, he needs to try because this is his mess. “Is this really what you want?”

“ Fuck if I know! ” Jisung is a jar, he can’t contain it all and it breaks. “I have no idea what the fucking hell I’m doing!” 

Arms shaking, dripping with cold sweat and taking the older with him, Jisung crumples to his knees. Pale and dark cobblestone of the street is under him, washed by the city and building lights, and he shudders until the world stops spinning, until Minho is hugging him. 

“It hurts hyung, it hurts so much. How the hell am I supposed to say goodbye to you when you are… when you are still here , mere inches away from me?! ” 

His eyes stray toward the gun on the ground. It looks sinful, reminding him of the nightdancer’s words. The resentment he harbors pours down into his lungs, then up to his throat, on his lips though, he stays quiet. Within the bounds of unbroken bond his solace resides, he chooses his words very carefully for he is scared that the reality will extend and find them. 

“We were… We were looking for someone ,” Jisung starts, his head seeking refuge in the curve of Minho's neck. He dares not look at his eyes. “A scientist in hiding. Knows a lot about the heart implants.” 

The older's eyes open wide in realization. “He is young but was born to scientists who probably put that thing in your heart.” The pirate presses his fingers against Minho’s pulse, then moves down to his heart. It paints a red, thin line. “It wasn’t only us though, who was looking for him I mean. Some other groups and well, of course, the government .” His mouth drips with venom as he nearly spits out the last word. 

“ They —” Jisung shudders, every inch of his frame trembling like a delicate blossom buffeted by the wind. He shudders and falters. “It’s my fault ,” His mouth is dry and his throat is sore, and his hands are bloodied with the love of his life. “They must have caught you because they were after me. Hyung, I… — I made you a target. ”

It’s unbearable then, for Jisung. “I’m sorry, hyung…” He croaks out. “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry …”

On the tip of Minho’s tongue, a thousand questions sit, ready to be rattled off like rapid fire. One long night’s worth of questions. But they don’t have time. “Jisungie, look at me please.”

But the pirate is stripped out of his coherence, guilt is eating him. So he goes, “I’m sorry hyung, it’s because of me. I did this, you’re dying and it’s because of—”

A hand gently lands between Jisung's strands, coaxing him to look up, pulling his head out of where it had been buried in the crook of his neck. With his other, he takes his hand in his, threading their fingers together.

“ Jisungie, love …” The nightdancer wets his lips, his voice is gentle and warm, softened by hushed sniffs and trembling, yet soothing. Jisung doesn’t want to hear what he is about to say. “You have to leave, you are in danger.”

“No.” He is so sure, so adamant. 

“Love,” Minho’s smile is terrible, sad and shaky and so, so tender. Jisung recognizes it all too well; it means Minho is scared. “they will know that you will be with me. You have to go. Now .”

“Please let me stay.” Jisung pleads and clings, his grasp on the older growing ever tighter. 

“ If they take you away, they won’t be as nice as— ”

“You did that before too . ” Jisung interrupts. “You kept turning me down, you kept asking me to leave before too hyung.”

He did that. Minho did that many times before. 

‘’You think you are worthy of my time, pirate boy? Better leave and run back to your little ship.’’ The nightdancer nibbles a bright red apple, its juice covering his fingers. A kaleidoscope of confetti under their shoes digs deeper into pavement cavities, each step giving out the same noises over and over. 

‘’Oh I know I am, that’s why I will wait.’’ Comes a cocky reply from the younger. Dark strands falling on his forehead have grown longer, almost touching the brown of his eyes. They are a mess but Jisung is content when Minho’s fingers caress them.

Minho, though, laughs. ‘’You will wither and die.’’ He reaches for the tin flask of expensive mead the pirate got for him but never offers a sip because he is just like that.

‘’You are a good cause to die for.’’ 

When he is done eating the apple, they stop at the entrance of the pier, Jisung a step behind.

“I will play with your heart.” The nightdancer says.

“I’ll give it to you on a silver tray.” The pirate answers.

“I will cut it into little pieces.” The nightdancer warns.

“Make sure they have nice shapes.” The pirate suggests.

“And feed them to the fish.” The nightdancer decides.

“Then I’ll be the ocean that’s in love with you.” The pirate claims.

“Jisung,” Minho turns his face to him, lips pressed into a taut, thin line. “nothing good comes from loving a whore.”

“They say the same for pirates. But you love me anyway.” Jisung smiles and takes Minho’s hand between his own to run a thumb across his palm.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“So you want me to spell it for you? I guess it starts with—“

— his heart . Minho remembers, he remembers it very well. That day, he figured that perhaps it wasn't only that something was wrong, but rather that not enough had gone right for him. Maybe he had ceased to anticipate anything good from the world or from people and, in return, he kept his heart away.

Then, Jisung held his heart between his palms and cared for him very, very dearly. Embraced him with compromise, gentleness, and the promise of his company. Taught him love . 

What a sick joke that wretched thing called love is. 

Minho looks at him, stricken, as this sinks in. What follows is slow. A thawing, before full spring melt. A mistake , a lethal one perhaps. But the nightdancer sighs, gives in , wiping away tears and the remaining blood on the pirate's face as the younger's right cheek displays a fiery red hue, visibly swollen, visibly bruised.

“C-Can I…” Jisung reaches out to touch his wrists, right above the pulse point. In his struggle to string words together, Minho gathers him in his arms in a silent nod and nestles Jisung's head upon his chest. 

In the night of the day, or in the morning of a silence, where they used to be two worn out bodies on top of each other, where they spent countless hours to lick, bite, kiss, caress, make love to the skin they preyed on, where their touches, thoughts, memories were engraved, there was this moment where they just used to exist with nothing but heartbeats, with nothing but silent inhales and exhales. Before Jisung had to leave, before Jisung had to follow his ship to the far away. A calm respite, a breathing point. 

It remains so as Jisung lays his ear against his heart, eyes sealed, listening to the steady rhythm of his heartbeat. The nightdancer presses kisses to his hair, peppering them along his temple, across his hairline, over the crown of his head. 

“What a stubborn little pirate you are,” Minho murmurs to the strands of his hair. “One that never listens to me.” One that I cherish for all of this, he doesn’t say. But tightens his hold and begins a gentle hum of lullaby. 

It's one that Jisung taught him years ago, from where he was born, an ocean away. A place where people are not half bone, half cold steel, where no one is an expandable part of the city, where freedom, untouched by status or riches, flies free as a wild bird. Where the sky unfurls as a starry blanket above.

The nightdancer understands it a little, the lullaby it is. The language sits foreign on his tongue yet there is a lovely tinge of hope in it, something calm, something that eases Jisung’s restless demeanor into a tranquil sea. 

It is, however, not the only thing that helps.

The rise and fall of the melody inscribes its lyrics upon Minho's flesh through the pirate's fingers that caress the tender skin beneath, matching the rhythm of the story within. Minho remains silent and unmoving to the younger’s interest, no protest appears on his lips. 

When the lullaby ends, Jisung brushes his fingertips against Minho’s bicep, coaxing his arm away from his chest. The nightdancer doesn’t fight it, with a soft sigh, he lets his arm fall slowly to his sides and closes his eyes. Jisung touches the part where there is healing scar tissue, and feels the texture of the glaring metal pieces. His fingers linger there, moving up and down carefully to seize it.

It is guilt, Minho feels. And more , Minho swallows.

It's disheartening to witness guilt gnawing at such a bright creature, such a bright soul.

Jisung’s hand strays away and lands on a safer territory, the nightdancer’s neck. The pirate pushes himself to plant kisses upon his warm skin, reading it like a poem, mapping out the peaks and valleys under his fingertips. Every touch is purposeful, feels familiar yet very new, a known stranger, Minho trembles beneath his touch, awaiting with unwavering patience. 

Jisung’s hand, akin to both a steadfast companion and a skillful poet, sings with his body, his soul. Minho hungers with a ravenous appetite, yearning for a tad more. Just a bit more, a touch more, and more still. Before the poem ends, he longs to hear the same verses again and again.

The insatiable part inside of him, then, guides his own hand to rest atop Jisung's, keeping it there with what appears to be encouraging authority. When he tugs it, slightly and impatiently, the pirate’s hand curls around his neck, and with an experimental squeeze, he repeats the action not once, not twice, but a third time, each time adding more pressure. 

Minho’s breath hitches.

Jisung tilts his head to stare at him, pupils blown wild, lips parted.

Hands press against his throat, slow and following the rhythm of their hearts. The pressure on him increases, his breath grows thinner. He feels lighter, the weight of the world lifting off of his shoulders. His eyes water, yet he lets himself soar.

And then the air is cut off. 

The instinctive surge of panic floods his lungs, and his lungs burn. He hears his own pulse thud in his ears. Dark spots flicker in front of his eyes. Every second is drawn out like molten sugar, stretching and stretching until it snaps.

It’s Jisung calling his name. Scared. His raw, desperate voice. His body freezed, muscles restricted.

It's his own hands on Jisung’s that pushed him to the limits then. That gripped harder, harder and harder .

Why , his lover’s eyes inquires. 

I wanted to know , he answers.

But they don’t talk when the sheer fabric he wears shifts, unveiling further parts of him to the Jisung. They don’t talk when the younger’s hand runs down between the straps of his top, untangling each part, fingertips ghosting over the older’s bare skin. They don’t talk about the hunger pooling inside their guts like a greedy, little child. 

The nightdancer watches him, eyes fixed on Jisung, and only on Jisung, his chest heaving heavily, up and down, under his lover’s hands when he is being opened like a cherished prize. Jisung savors the sight as whole, feels him beneath the tips of his fingers, yet leaves the unbuttoned shirt on and doesn’t touch the skirt.

Under the pearl tipped gleam of the moon, under red, blue, purple hues of the city night, Minho has so much more to look at, like the sinful burgundy color of his lips that smudge at the edges, bitten and puffed. Hazy pink powder just above his eyelashes that sparkles in the dim light. Lithe yet sculpted arms and legs, a sinuous flat belly, sharp hip bones, mauve nipples puckered into tight buds and two silver hoops pierced through each one.

It’s a feast for Jisung, his last supper , when he wraps his lips around at the perked nub, nabbing, licking and sucking it. His gloved hand runs down, tracing and mapping the familiar skin with pinches, digging purples and reds until it sits on the curve of the older’s waist. He takes handfuls of lean muscle between and gropes it, hard , eyes closed, breath ragged, just enough to make him shiver and moan.

Neither wants sweet, neither desires it. 

A salty drop curls over his left nipple, and the pirate’s hands find purchase in sliding up his ribcage to wipe it away and rest against his heart, buffering the loud beating of it with every breathy in and exhale. He scrapes his teeth along Minho’s pounding pulse, growing more impatient with the needy noises the nightdancer lets out. 

Then, the fabric of his skirt is pushed away, half flutters and gathers on his belly until skin is bare, glowing, half still covering his thighs. 

The pirate stops still and with a controlled move, he pulls away. Brown eyes, fogged over with lust and desire, darkens for a moment. Growling, possessive, he looks at the figure below him. A mottled tapestry of red and purple bruises, ignited by his attentions.

“ Jisungie …” The nightdancer parts his legs. Flutters his eyelashes. Bites his lips. Brings his own hand down, down, down. Come, he wills. Come to me, be with me, let me be what you need, need me.

Bare-chested and exposed, the nightdancer arches up into Jisung when the pirate’s gloved fingers go straight down for his entrance. Pushing his lace underwear to the side, like peeling a sweet, ripe fig layer by layer, Jisung touches him there, brief and light. The leather of his glove is smooth and a little too stiff yet unbearably intimate. Jisung makes him naked in ways Minho could never imagine.

“Let me,” Jisung murmurs, “please you, hyung.” He tastes, where Minho’s jaw meets his neck, sweat, salt, peaches and cherries, white flowers and honey, sinks his teeth in, the nightdancer inhales, sharp. 

Minho shivers, mouth open, dragging in heavy gulps of air yet thrusts his hips to take his gloved finger in, every inch of his body burning, his neglected member hard and leaking, eyes half lidded and hazy with want. “Jisungie…” He moans for him. “ Touch me more. ” 

The pirate’s gloved hands cradle his jaw, a finger on parted lips, then it is slipped inside, a tongue wet and slippery welcomes him in. The older’s mouth wide open for Jisung’s taking and Jisung takes, and takes. In and out, Minho sucks them, stealing heavy licks, eyes on Jisung, his steady grip on the pirate’s shoulder. It goes deeper, pressing his tongue with intent, gags him until another gloved finger finds a way in and settles inside. 

Lips parted, reddened, slick with spit, a whimper falls from Minho’s throat when fingers residing in his mouth leave. He tries to catch him, Jisung , then gathers him in, sliding his arms around his neck, he straddles the younger in ease and not caring the cobblestone beneath his knees have sharp edges, he starts moving, a slow, undulating series of movements that looks more akin to dancing than grinding.

The nightdancer awakens such arousal in Jisung that he groans, he moans, he growls, his own cock throbbing in his pants. He thrusts, ruts, blindly against Minho’s moves, desperate yet eager. The voices that leave his mouth are loud and obscene, almost animalistic, rumbling. 

He has never been so attuned to another’s body, never longed for so much skin.

Jisung circles Minho's hole, pressing teasingly against the tight ring, earning a whimper from the older. The nightdancer’s hips twitch back and forward like he wants Jisung to stick them in, each movement pressing their hardened bulges together, drawing sharp exhales from the younger.

Their lips find each other in fervor, all teeth and bites when a finger finally, finally , pushes inside. First the one, twisting and hot and slick, the two, scissoring his tight flesh loose, and then three, burning, so much burning because his fingers in leather are thick and it hurts but he bites down hard when Jisung tries to pull away. The nightdancer cries out feeling full, feeling Jisung inside him everywhere.

Gloved fingers thrust in and out, Minho writhes and whimpers and arches his back and rolls his hips to meet with Jisung. He plants his hands on the younger’s chest and rides him like that, matching his pace with the fingers inside, dragging his cock roughly against Jisung’s, shoving against him in impatient, brutal thrusts. The pirate takes it, takes it all without protest, letting Minho reap his pleasure from his body. 

“Please,” Minho begs, his voice caught now in something like a sob. “ enough with fingers, ” 

The nightdancer hisses and mourns their loss with a whimper when Jisung’s gloved fingers slide out of him. “Hurry,” Minho demands and lets his hands find the younger’s crotch just as Jisung runs his hands to cup his ass, fondling and squeezing it until his lover is struggling with the zipper of his leather pants. 

That earns the younger a purposeful pressure over his tenting member and Jisung is groaning, a sharp growling like breathy exhale wills to leave his teeth bitten lips. 

It’s too much and not enough for both of them when the nightdancer finally frees him from the confines of his pants and under garments, his hand is around his rock hard, dripping with precum cock. 

Yet there is this anticipation, when their eyes meet, when Minho’s skillful hands strokes his length up and down, spreading the fluid leaking from the tip over the shaft, when he is pressing his half naked body to Jisung’s clothed one, using his knees to elevate himself to position himself over him and lining the younger’s cock. 

When he finally, finally sinks in, the nightdancer wails and reaches for him as he pushes forward steadily, legs wrapped around the pirate’s waist, welcoming him in. Kisses him with teeth and tongue to hide himself, body trembling, lips quivering and vision blurring with tears of pain and bliss . The stretch is burning him when their punched out sounding gasps fill the air, yet he is in bliss. 

Minho pulses up and down, working Jisung's cock into him inch by inch, welcoming him in his velvet soft, warm home. Once their hips are flush together, he sits and squeezes and rolls his hips back and forth. His muscles shake ever so slightly with tightly wound restraint, and the nightdancer fails to hold back an embarrassingly high moan.

"Good?" Jisung murmurs, leaning forward to press a soft kiss to his lover’s arched throat.

“Yes, oh, so fucking —” The nightdancer breathes, as he arches and spreads his legs wider, reveling when Jisung slips deeper, the stretch, the burning sweet as a sin, the head of his cock brushing his insides, not letting anywhere remain untouched. 

"Fuck me," Minho begs, once he regains his voice, "fuck me good, Jisungie ."

It is slow and gentle first, drawing the pleasure out for them both. Jisung massages Minho’s ass with one hand, kneading it like a cat, and caressing the lacy tights on his thigh with the other. He follows the pace of Minho’s hips, hushed breathy groans, moans and compliments caress their lips, eyes never leaving each other.

It grows desperate quickly when the stretch no longer burns, when the skin around Jisung’s cock takes his shape very well. Then it is brutal, the slick, wet sound of flesh meeting flesh, and the harsh sounds of their panting breaths, intermingling. Gentle, desperate whispers and curses filter through the air, like flower petals in a storm.

The older drops his forehead to Jisungs’ shoulder, squeezing his eyes shut, breathing in the scent of leather and sweat. “Jisung, love, that’s so, oh, that’s so good— “

Jisung tangles one hand in the nightdancer’s hair when Minho cries, more, more his leaking erection bobbing inside his underwear. Heady little ah ah ahs fall from his mouth with every thrust, and he’s rolling his hips in time with Jisung’s movements. As the pirate’s hand winds in Minho’s hair, grabbing a fistful, and pulling his head back, rough and sudden, the nightdancer arches his back in a beautiful curve, leaving his chest exposed, his sheer shirt slipping from his one shoulder almost down the way to his elbow. 

The pirate takes in the sight of his lover; the nightdancer spread over him like an offering to a god.

Minho, glistening with sweat, hair falling around his face —tousled and messy and fanned out, eyes alight and beautiful, leaning close. It’s the way his skin through a haze of reds, purples and muted yellows, the dips of his skin shadowed. It contrasts with the glow of the light over the long lines of his thighs, his hip bones, the valleys of his ribs. Each move, and skin glitters, dances, muscles draw lines, lines draw love.

It’s a haunting thing, really. Entirely enchanting. Settled over him, Minho’s ass stretched around his cock. Tight and warm as he pulls in Jisung like he belongs there.

When Jisung position his head in front of Minho’s chest, then bends down to tug his teeth against the nipple ring, the nightdancer whimpers, clenching down hard, hands moving from atop Jisung’s back to scrabbling for purchase against his now messy strands. “Yeah, there,” Minho pants. “ I-I like it…”

Without thinking the pirate bites the silver ring around Minho’s nipple and snaps into him, picking up the pace with every slap of skin against skin. Jisung’s so one with the older now, he’s sweating, groaning, gritting his teeth as he drinks every sobbing fuck and love and Jisung and Jisungs .

A muffled cry escapes from Minho’s mouth as he finds that angle, brushing up against that secret, dark spot within him Jisung knows like the back of his hand. He squirms, fucking him in shallow dips, again and again, just at the edge, just enough to make him shiver and moan. Then he thrusts in, slow and deep, hard as he can bear, like a cat playing with his prey, savoring the feeling each thrust brought with their hips grinding together. 

"Jisung," Minho manages, barely a sob, a plea, a prayer, " please , Ji... Jisung..." 

The older’s painfully hard member, straining with precum, against the scratchy material of his lace underwear and still confined in a tight place between their bodies, each of their body rolls and thrusts, desperate for attention— It’s too much when the younger’s cock inside him brushes and hits that spot again, and again —

The nightdancer tightens around Jisung, shuddering, moaning and crying out sinfully, lost and so raw , spilling messily all over his stomach, nails digging half-moon marks on Jisung’s arms. Clenches down hard around the pirate’s cock that he groans and comes as well, burying himself as deep as he can inside Minho’s hole. Pulsing and throbbing still, they ride out their orgasms together.

It’s the post orgasm that comes sinking down over him, heavy and ruthless when Jisung stills.

Eyebrows furrowed, low, shallow breaths, one hand clenching and unclenching, Jisung is in seconds ago, searching, searching and searching . It was the work of bone in Minho’s slender wrists, under his pale skin; it was the vulnerable arch of Minho’s nape as he writhed, whimpered above him; it was the droplets of sweat that drip from his temple and jaw as he was coming with a high pitched moan next to his ears—

Something raw is crawling up from his abdomen, all the way to his fingertips, down to his toes, and melding right at his throat. It eats away at him like termites, boring him open for the world to see, bare and ready for the taking. His skin itches in a way he doesn’t understand, as though waiting to be torn open and turned inside out, as though the sensation will subside only when he is tucked safely between —

— a gentle hand falls on his cheek. Jisung jerks once and shudders. “ Shh. I’ve got you. ” The voice says.

Only when he is tucked safely between Minho and his dance, his home.

“I’ve got you Jisungie,” He finds himself cocooned in warm arms, and the voice, that of Minho, a mere whisper away, soft and alive. Minho sifts his hands through the younger’s hair spilling over his fingers, brushing aside the ones clinging to his skin and tugging them behind his ears. “That dark place,” He murmurs, “don’t linger there.”

What the hell am I going to do without you , he wants to ask.

Why are you not upset with me, he wonders.

How are you so forgiving, he questions.

Because even when half naked, spent, bruised with Jisung’s greed; the older is a willing surrender before unconditional trust instead of possession. To close his eyes and need not doubt intentions behind a kind caress, to abandon the calculating mind and embrace instead the heart that wishes, that yearns, that falls without fear of the crash; this is what Minho is to him, his home, his everything.

“ I’m sorry ,” Jisung confesses, because he is, he is sorry, he’s sorry that he’s who he is, he’s sorry they met —no, he wishes he was sorry they met, but he’s selfish—, he’s sorry he’s somehow ended up tangled in Minho’s heart.

It is uncomfortable for both of them, with the younger’s softened cock and spill still inside and sticky, but Minho lets him cry. Encircled in his arms, Minho catches everything, every slip that Jisung has wanted to let go of for so long.

Until his sobs dim, Minho doesn’t move. Shares pieces of himself with Jisung, and welcomes him still with no restraint, no protest. 

So easy like this , Jisung thinks. So easy when it's in his nature to lean on him, as if he is meant to share his every high and drop, still buried deep inside the older’s warmth. He could lose himself in the utter wholeness of this feeling, of skin on skin, lost, finally found and lost once more.

“ God ,” it comes out of Jisung breathy and unexpected as his head falls slack on his lover’s shoulder, fingers lightly trailing the older’s soft waist, his neck, then the hand that cups his cheek. Maybe it’s just in the way they fit together, wit to word to mind, interweaving as easily as their fingers when Jisung’s fold through Minho’s.

“Tell me,” Minho says. It’s a whisper, something that merely slipped off the nightdancer’s tongue like a drop of rain off a leaf. “Tell me Jisungie, what’s on your mind?” 

“You,” Jisung mutters, pained. Nothing like those times when he gives the same answer with mischievous glint in his eyes just to tease the older to hear the light frustration in his voice. The memory of him leaning into the kiss like a flower seeking the sun, with no urgency, no race to completion. Lazy and sweet, melting some candied surface lick by tender lick. Tongues roll between lips and soft moans, curious and playful. 

So much love. 

“I don’t want to say goodbye.” 

And I want to live , Minho wants to say. With you , he wants to add but hushes the voice on the tip of his tongue, letting it die in darkness. Instead says, “Yet you did before, many many times before Jisungie…” There is no accusation, no bite in Minho’s tone. “You chased kisses after kisses, and when it was time, you left for where you belong. It doesn’t have to be any different.”

“ Where I belong?! ” Anger fires in Jisung like a lighter, like a paper cut, quick and growing, roots tangled in despair. “I wanted to be with you ! Where I belong is with you!”

The edge of hurt in Jisung’s voice leaves sparks on his skin. But he absorbs, letting everything sink in. “But would you have stayed if I had asked?”

Something flickers in Jisung’s eyes, for a brief moment. The nightdancer sees his hesitation, his doubt. Before he can find his words, Minho’s voice follows. 

"You shouldn't have, Jisungie. If I ever asked, you should have never said yes." It feels like a threshold, what he says that is. “You wished to give me freedom, how could I possibly have asked the opposite? A cage remains a cage, even if it is as vast as a city.”

A cage for a bird, a bird named Minho. In Jisung’s dreams, Minho belonged to the skies, belonged to the stars, under the sun with a carefree smile. In his dreams Minho had time.

“I imagined an us .” From hopes through the wear and the weeping, Jisung’s voice cracks. “Us holding hands in skyline and I’m taking you to solar dance , us next to The Pink Moon and having a picnic because it's the color of your favorite wine, us in my small pod, listening hymns of planar lichens and I’m teaching you how to knit like my people—” Shivers passing through his taut shoulders, it lashes like a snapped tightrope. A tainted heart, a guilty being. “I promised you a future and look what I’ve done!”

Minho’s insides crumples with the same misery that he tries to scour from his face. He keeps Jisung’s hands firmly between his, brings it to his lips, apologizes and soothes in kisses. “You weren’t alone in any of those, I thought about us too.” 

Scenarios in his head, fleeting, fading dreams, some close to reality, some with no actual goal. Many of them. Always with Jisung. 

“Am I angry?” He continues. His throat is sour as a dancing light catches his eyes. “ Very . But to you? No, never to you. You are never to blame, love, Jisungie.” 

The nightdancer thinks about every turn he took, and every turn he didn’t take. Right ones and the wrong ones.The sliver of hope born within it, which brought a name. The pirate first, Han Jisung then and at last love, heart, home . For a life he breathed day to day, yet never lived till they met. 

It started with his heart.  

No. 

It started with Jisung.

Jisung, his love, his heart, his home.

Resentment curls around the nightdancer like a throttling serpent, coil upon coil. For the things he is being ripped apart, for the wounds in his heart, in his dreams, in the hand entwined with Jisung, where they sit, how they breathe, everything . “The city gives, the city takes. No agency, no free will.” 

The pirate makes a guttural noise.

”I will beg, I will kneel,” Jisung's voice is stripped bare and his soul raw with anger, hurt . The older's words rip his mind like knives at fine fabric. “or kill for you. I won’t surrender hyung.” 

“ Don’t, ” There is a knot in his throat, growing with fear. “Hope is a vicious kick when you're deep enough.”

Jisung bites down on his tongue until there's blood in his mouth, bitter and coppery. “Would you forgive me if I tried?" He asks, voice thick and hoarse, the sound is wound into his words.

Minho’s gaze lingers on Jisung's gun, forgotten on the ground. “Would that make any difference?” Then eyes his right hand, right arm. Remembers what he is to become once again. “You’ve already decided.” 

There is a weight there that Jisung doesn’t miss. A sliver of disappointment is woven into his words. But before he has a chance to utter a word, a buzzing sound fills his earpiece.

[Sung, there is a sentinel activity in Lowerside Paletown.] It’s Felix’s voice. [West of 6th Point, very close to you. Signals are scattered around but frequent. You with Minho?]

The nightdancer springs up in one swift motion and tugs Jisung to his feet, coaxing him to stand up. The atmosphere is suddenly so tense, a deep fear lurks in his gut. Goosebumps go down Jisung’s back, the feeling of his own vulnerability curls up in his stomach like a cold snake; he feels stranger to his own hands. 

“Yeah, but—”

[You need to be back.] Chan takes over. His authority leaves no room for doubt. Urgent, panicked even. [Keep the old ruins on your left and don’t cross the fish market.] 

Minho is tucking Jisung’s cock inside his underwear and zipping his leather pants. His hands don't linger more than necessary, his touch brief, practical. Cold . He spares a quick glance at Jisung and he is bending down, retrieving the younger’s gun from the ground. 

There are tears pooled at the corners of Minho’s eyes. His lips form a thin line, hurt, hushed and haunted, “Hyung—” 

“ Time to go ,” Minho cuts him decisively. His voice pained. It kills Jisung. 

Minho takes hold of his wrist, his own fingers tucked against the younger’s pulse point, just above his leather gloves. 

Jisung follows.

Great darkness looms above with the vast expanse of the night sky observing in hushed stillness when they cross street to street, shadow to shadow. The sounds of their steps blend together: the thud and snap of his boots and his brace. Crusted tufts of weeds poke out from the cavities between the cobblestone. Trash is plenty, used condoms are thrown around and under their feet. 

They move as quick and as subtle as possible, no words exchanged between, no reassurances, nothing about what lies ahead. Jisung dreads the night, dreads the end, dreads the fates. 

Dreads the moment when Minho's firm grip on his wrist gradually loosens until it vanishes, completely gone.

They are heading towards the underground passage when Jisung's footing falters. He avoids the fall, swiftly regaining his balance as he leans on a stack of heavy crates to support his weight and immediately his eyes search for Minho. But the nightdancer is not with him, Minho remains behind.

He looks small in the alleyway, a black hole of shadows covering half of his body. What’s left in the light is his disheveled clothes and his heaving chest, heavy breaths that escape. Ducked out of sight, there are hushed voices, the usual hum of drunkard tunes are wiped out.

Jisung expects the worst, his eyes are running all over his lover’s body. “What’s wrong?” He retreats to Minho’s side. ”Are you hurt hyung?”

The nightdancer looks concerned, his gaze down heavy on his ankle, eyebrows furrowed. He is silent when Jisung’s patience runs thin. 

Another buzzing sounds in his ear as he is tugging Minho to get going. 

[Sung,] It’s Chan again. [in front of you—]

— A gunshot rings out, followed by searing discomfort.

Jisung feels a pain growing in his abdomen— down low, just beneath his ribs. It blossoms like a flower opens, like mildew spreads across a bolt of fabric left in the damp and the dark. His body convulses, a stabbing pain wrestling command from his limbs, and he tumbles to the ground. His legs fail him.

The world blurs around him when his head hits the ground. He hears Chan’s voice, fraught with desperation and fear. He calls his name, again and again . 

He hears the sudden silence of the alleys.

He hears heavy footsteps. 

Above him is Minho, loomed with his gun firmly grasped, the safety lock disengaged, and the ominous pulsating of its purple aura stilled upon discharge. His face shrouded in stoic neutrality is an unfamiliar visage, one that sends a shiver coursing down Jisung's spine, for it seems as though he gazes upon a stranger, a presence devoid of discernible emotion, any recognition. 

Oh , he thinks when realization comes gushing with reds in his abdomen. Another fruitless endeavor blossoming within his grasp. 

I failed you, didn’t I?  

The end, it is then.

"L-love," Jisung manages, as shorthand for I love you . He coughs once, and tastes blood. It’s bitter on his tongue. "Forgi..."

Light flutters in and out of sight. Black creeps in. Disappears into a weird red color. Dyes back to black. The deathly silence that falls on the earth around them as he is swallowed into the void.

He breathes, he chokes, he doesn’t breath.

alternative ending

this is the alternative ending, taking place right after they had sex. after this exact paragraph:

The nightdancer tightens around Jisung, shuddering, moaning and crying out sinfully, lost and so raw, spilling messily all over his stomach, nails digging half-moon marks on Jisung’s arms. Clenches down hard around the pirate’s cock that he groans and comes as well, burying himself as deep as he can inside Minho’s hole. Pulsing and throbbing still, they ride out their orgasms together.

He is panting hard, forehead on his lover’s shoulders, tucked in the crook of his neck; there is something in Jisung’s hands. Similar to his own, familiar, warm, soft. It’s the older’s hands, folded into his own, keeping him steady, keeping him there with him. Safe and sheltered and held. Jisung loves his hands. 

Then there is something cold between his hands, the right one, familiar yet not welcomed, not now. It belongs to the blurred distances of his mind, not when he needs to catch his breath within the confines of Minho's lips, within the depths of his lungs, against his very skin, and deep within the sanctuary of his heart.

He feels a whisper brushing his ear first, and a faint touch of lips. “I love you Han Jisung,” the voice says. “I love you so much. Don’t forget that.”

An abrupt, inexplicable wave of dread washes over him.

And then, there is a sound. Loud . Pulses with red, pulses with terror. Dripping in his sides, between in his hands is the answer, is the horror of his worst nightmares. Minho’s hands, over his, covering his gun. 

His gun.

Aimed at his heart. 

“Hyung…” A raw, keening whimper crawls out of his mouth as Jisung’s body quivers with the intense shaking of his head. “No. No, no, no, no !” 

The nightdancer smiles. It is tinged with sadness, one that never truly finds its way into the depths of his eyes. His hand, as it gently caresses Jisung's cheeks, quivers with an undeniable fragility and is weak. “D-Don’t…” he tries. Tears, like silent raindrops, kiss his cheeks. “let them…” 

Yet death consumes him when his parted lips meet with no sound but blood. It is red, so much red. 

A buzzing sounds in his ears. 

[ Sung, we heard gunshots—“] Oh Felix, he doesn’t know. [ fuck, you should leave, there is—]  

Jisung throws away the earpiece. 

Nothing at all compares to the throbbing, hot, all encompassing ache that is in his heart. Nothing when his breath comes in harsh choking gasps, punctuated by broken syllables of Minho’s name.

Nothing. 

The pirate catches him in his arms when Minho stumbles forward, warm wet blood gushing from the wound in his chest. He keeps him close, close to his own heart. 

“Hyung, please say something…” 

Minho doesn’t stir, doesn’t speak a single word.

“Take mine, please.” 

Take my heart , he means. For it is already crushed, for it is already gone. 

Jisung burrows his face in his neck, reaches for his warmth, his scent. “ Stay with me. ” he cries and cries and cries. 

And it is another day. High above the earth, a vast orange blanket of summer warmth embraces them. Their garments are weightless, as Jisung cradles Minho against both himself and the wall. The older, his laughter ringing through the air, toys with Jisung's unruly locks, his soft cheeks are dusted with pinks and reds. Flickering colors, hummingbird beats around them; they, like two kindred spirits, dance and dance.

Yet Jisung doesn’t have another days. They are gone. All gone. 

There is nothing after this. He is halved. It's a raw abrasion, scratched over his insides, sanding down the center of her heart. Jisung hasn't stopped crying.

And the nightdancer lets him cry. He can’t stroke his hair, can’t kiss his tears away, but can let him cry. 

It starts with his heart. 

And it ends with his heart.