writing: because i love you, love, in fire and blood.

[caihong]

an apocalyptic universe for my favourite 99z in nct. it's some of my best writing i think but i just have no motivation to write anymore of this T___T it was originally meant to be a xiaomarkren but i lost my fire (pun unintended) to write before he made it in. anyways! enjoy </3

 

rating: mature

archive warning: no archive warnings apply

relationship: mark/xiaojun

word count: 2.6k+

Mark had had Dejun’s hand in his own, running his fingers over the knobs of his knuckles and over the peeling skin on the pads of his fingertips when their English teacher collapsed in front of the class. A long streak of watery black ink striked through the entire paragraph she had written and her body was still, folded in a way that had Mark retching when the head teacher had to untangle her limbs from underneath her body with a deafening crunch like a sole of the shoe on gravel, lifting up her head only to expose the red welts forming across the expanse of her forehead, her eyes closed but the veins around them darkening in a proliferating web of crimson red.

 

By the time the students had run to the office and called for the ambulance, everyone knew she was dead. Struck and eaten alive by something unknown, but by the time she dropped on that previously nondescript summer afternoon, so had thousands across the state and millions across the nation. That summer before the fatal impacts of man-made climate change culminating in a disease-ridden heatwave had hit them, Mark had spent the last two months writing a song for Dejun’s birthday. A love song, to put it plainly. Mark’s entrenched feelings for his best friend for the past five years channelled into this four-chord, easy-on-the-ears tune, with lyrics that he’s spent what feels like a million summers writing. For them to illustrate how Dejun has made him feel since their friendship suddenly took a left turn when Mark was faced with the horrifying realisation that he wanted Dejun in a way that ate him up inside rather than co-existed peacefully with the rest of his emotions, catalysed by Dejun smiling at him— fondly, Mark insists, hoping that he wasn’t projecting— when he called him stupid after his awful attempt at a British accent. Then it was Dejun telling Mark in a hushed whisper on their way home that he had a crush, to Mark realising promptly after Wong Yukhei waltzed into Maths after basketball practice that the Crush was definitely not on him, and having this green viscous liquid immediately form and coagulate in his gut, searing his insides. Dejun complaining that he hadn’t a boyfriend yet or frankly, anyone to kiss, and Mark’s immediate thought being, ‘I’m right here’. Dejun staring at Mark when he thought he wouldn’t notice, their hands brushing on the bus home, ankles tangled on the floor of Dejun’s bedroom, strumming random chord progressions until something stuck.

It was late July when his English teacher died on their classroom floor and Mark never quite managed to play that song for Dejun.

Families with their entire lives packed into luggages and into their weathered sedans clogged up all the major highways leading out of the hotspot that was their hometown, eager to escape to the North. It was colder there, the news outlets that were still operating out of the city posited, lacking substantial evidence to back up said claims. Those same families would be struck by the series of hurricanes and tsunamis obliterating entire coastal towns where every single one of those highways would pass through to get to the Northern peninsula and be subjected to the same fate as those they had tried so hard to leave behind.

Mark’s parents hadn’t been offered the same liberties. Not even offered the chance to uproot their family of three before a semi smashed into their car on their way home and killed them upon impact.

A blessing from his priest and a tug on the wrist by Dejun into the Xiaos’ home.

“It wasn’t even the fucking wave Jun.” Mark choked out. His voice had gone hoarse hours ago and the skin on his face had gone tight, layers of dried tears caked on top of each other.

Dejun pulled him closer, leaning against the wall as he tucked Mark’s head next to his and ran circles around the middle of his back with his hand.

“We couldn’t even—” Leave together. Die together. If they’d even manage to go back to Canada, maybe they could’ve lived out the next five years. Mark could tell them about the boy he once loved, Dad could teach him a few more songs on guitar, Mum would retell the stories about her escapades across the world before she met Dad even though Mark’s heard them a million times before.

“Oh Mark…” Mark doesn’t know what he wants him to say either. He only presses a kiss to Mark’s temple and holds him closer. It’s all they can do now, as the world burns underneath the soles of their bare feet.

The next morning, Dejun wakes Mark up with a soft shake and Mark takes a moment to gather himself, before realising that no, it wasn’t all a fucked-up dream after all.

“Did you sleep okay?” Dejun asks more out of habit than with actual sincerity, because God knows that the answer isn’t what everyone would like to hear. Mark murmurs out a sound to indicate that he heard him and unwraps himself out of the duvet.

“Mark, my parents— they…” Dejun sighs, sitting on the edge of the mattress as Mark rubs the sleep out of his eyes and sits up against the headboard.

“They didn’t tell me, but they prepared a meal downstairs. For your parents. We don’t have to eat if you don’t want to, they didn’t let me know about it and I would’ve asked you if you wanted it but—” He’s frenzied, as frenzied as Dejun can be, voice growing high with his hands wringing at the sheets.

“Hey Dej it’s alright, that’s—” Mark hadn’t even thought about commemorating them. Not that he’d know how, believing his priest’s rushed prayer before someone else had hurried him back inside the church was enough.

“Let me get ready and I’ll be down in a sec, okay?” he continues and Dejun lets out another stuttered sigh. Mark puts his hand on his cheek, rubbing at the top of Dejun’s cheekbones.

“It’s okay I’m— I’m grateful. They didn’t have to.” Mark doesn’t like seeing Dejun upset and when he looks up at him from under the cover of his fringe and eyelashes, the tune of the song enters his mind like water trickling down a stream.

“If you change your mind, just let me know hm?” Dejun says softly, taking Mark’s hand from his face and holding it in his own. He’s warm like always.

Mark nods and Dejun gets up, closing the door behind him.

Maybe Mark is a horrible, selfish human being, using this to justify his desperate wants, but sleeping with Dejun by his side instead of by himself in the guest room might have offered him smoother sleep. One without memories disguised as dreams strangling the sanity left in him.

He rifles through his duffel for his black long-sleeved tee he used to wear for dance practice, and a pair of black jeans that he managed to stuff inside before he left.

He thinks about calling for Dejun. Telling him he doesn’t want it anymore, couldn’t eat a morsel of the carefully prepared food no matter the kind intent behind it. Alas, his inability to say no, especially to a family who took him in without second thought and for a boy he knows he loves down to his bones, reigns superior to his deteriorating mental state.

They greet him with soft ‘good morning’s, eyes flitting between the table and Mark’s expression, probably by effect of Dejun scolding them if the muted argument in Cantonese Mark heard from upstairs was telling of anything, and Dejun offers the seat next to him. Mark sits down and straightens his posture and beats Dejun’s parents before they can apologise profusely.

“Thank you.” The two of them lose the tension in their shoulders almost instantly. They take a seat and murmur something to Dejun before they pick up their chopsticks as Mark had done.

“Did you want to say— a prayer?” Dejun is hesitant and Mark knows they’re thinking the same thing. That nothing they do, no meals they’ll eat or makeshift procession they can conduct while people walk the streets with flames licking at their viscera without them knowing, and the world burns and burns and burns, will honour his parents’ death nor bring them back. It’s out of courtesy rather than anything grounded in reality and Mark feels like crying.

There’s no ghost money, nor gifting of envelopes, or bundles flowers that Mark knows frames most East Asian funeral practices. Saying grace is not meant for celebrating death nor sending wishful messages to those who have passed on.

“Mark you don’t have to—” Dejun takes his prolonged silence as a no but Mark shakes his head and grabs Dejun’s hand in his and offers his right to Dejun’s father.

He’ll do it to offer solace to Dejun’s parents, who haven’t a clue on what grace truly signifies nor what role religion plays in Mark’s life now, after all of this, but not himself.

Mark closes his eyes and picks out a memory of dimly-lit dinner and two hands in his own.

‘For what we are about to receive may the Lord make us truly Grateful. Thankful. Amen.’ Mark has never prayed without purpose or sincerity, and despite it all, he knows this time won’t make it his first. Is that something to be proud of? Does that make him strong or weak for hanging onto the last thing that reminds him of two warm hands around his own that he’ll never have again?

They repeat Amen after him and nothing changes.

There’s an array of vegetarian dishes on the table and they eat in silence, save for Dejun’s ‘here, have some more,’ that comes every few minutes when Mark empties his bowl of savoury toppings. Dejun’s parents eat slowly and spare a few glances to Mark every time he tries something new to gauge his reaction, and he tries his best to be animated about it without it coming off disingenuous, or even worse, like it’s made him forget about the original reason for the meal.

“Mark— it’s okay,” Dejun does an awful job of hiding his amusement, and squeezes his arm as Mark shovels in another mouthful of steamed mushroom and carrot. “I’ll let them know you like it.” He follows that with a rapid and fatigued string of words that put the two adults in front of them at ease.

“Eat slowly,” Dejun’s mother says in Korean with a small smile and Mark exhales slowly and gives them a sheepish one back.

Breakfast is a lovelier affair than what Mark expected it to be. He insists on washing the dishes and Dejun scrambles after him before they end up doing it together in the end. Having Dejun so close to him, for now, is the one mercy he’ll forever be thankful for.

But like all things in the face of the end of the world, it doesn’t last.

Dejun’s parents have packed up their things by the time night comes and are set to grab the last plane back to Guangzhou in the morning while Mark was supposed to take the earliest train to a distant aunt’s a few hours away. Dejun had stayed mum through the entire exchange except for translating in between while Mark assured them that his aunt was ready for him, that she has been since news of his parents travelled through church, while Dejun’s parents only nodded and gave him one last embrace. When they go upstairs, Dejun stays with Mark on the couch, pressed to his side where Mark wants him to be for as long as they have left, as they sit in resounding silence.

“You alright?” Will Dejun lose a part of himself when morning comes as well?

“Mark, I don’t want to lose you.” And there he goes. Falling and falling and falling.

Mark turns to face him but Dejun stops him, refusing to look him in the eye and instead wraps his arms around him, trapping him against the arm of the couch.

“I want to stay with you.” He presses his forehead onto Mark’s shoulder and his shuddering breath against Mark’s collarbone brands into his skin an indelible wound.

“No, no, Dej please… you can’t.” Mark whispers into his temple, cradling the boy in his arms. He’s the last thing on this scorched Earth Mark will ever love and he’s leaving him forever in six hours. He can’t cry, he can’t cry, he can’t when Dejun will take that as a sign to stay.

“Mark I— I can’t leave you.”

He never got to sing that song for him.

“You have to, I won’t let you— I won’t let you stay.” Dejun is sobbing now, clutching onto the fabric of his shirt as it darkens across his shoulder and arm. Almost like Mark’s the last thing he’ll ever love on this scorched Earth too.

“I’m so sorry.” Dejun presses his palm to the side of Mark’s head and presses him close, and it’s so hard to breathe. Their bodies are melded against the floral upholstery and Mark wishes for this weight to stay with him even when it’s gone. A phantom of the boy he loves down to his bones is what he wants, if he can’t have anything else.

He’s never going to sing that song for him.

It will chain him to Mark and he would never wish that upon Dejun. He could never chase for that emotional liberation at the expense of his precious life. Nothing would ever possess him to commit an act so murderous as love.

“Can you promise me you’ll try?” Dejun asks wetly, and brings himself to face Mark, hands pressed onto the back of couch and the other on the arm. His eyes are red and the skin on his cheeks is taut with teartracks. Mark doesn’t know if even death could alleviate him of this.

“You have to promise me first.” Mark responds, and the pressure on his chest threatens to slice him open and expose his heart to the one person who can never know.

The only thing that will give him the will to stay alive is if the only thing he’s living for tries as well.

“For you, always.” Dejun whispers with a terrifying clarity in his eyes that cracks whatever’s left of Mark’s heart.

It’s unfair. So fucking unfair. They deserve more than this. They deserve more than exchanging empty promises to stay alive when they know full well it’s out of their control whether they live or die in the days after this. They deserve more than one shared meal and a mere few hours soaking in each other’s presence, fingers tapping rhythms on the body of Dejun’s guitar while the other hand is in the grasp of another’s before they’re torn apart like paper to flame.

They deserve to have each other, if nothing else, as the world crumbles and falls way to the poison doused in its soil by the humans who’ve inhabited it and stripped it of what it’s worth for millennia.

They barely keep apart up until Dejun reaches Mark’s room. There’s an unspoken agreement that they can’t be together tonight. The spell of night might reveal what they’ve kept locked under padlock after padlock and once wrenched open, there’s no going back. And yet.

It’s barely three in the morning when Dejun storms in and shakes Mark awake.

“Mark, do you trust me?” He’s never seen him look this afraid.