they’ve always had this habit, the two of them, the twin set of heartbeats throbbing between them, in tuned somehow, a magic thread entwined around them, carrying them together along the same parallel lineage of life– they’ve always been able to read each other, almost on instinct, almost intuitively, as though they burn in the same wavelength, and jaewon has never thought of it as a disadvantage, except once. one time, when she’d looked him in the eye and introduced him to her boyfriend, her eventual fiance– but other than that, excluding that, he’s always known they are of the same feathers, they are of the same breed, their eyes connecting and saying more between them than their lips ever could, their atmospheres melting and shifting in perfect alignment; it’s what makes their strategies so profound, so ironclad, so indomitable. her faith in him, his belief in her, the unshakeable foundations of their understanding of each other.

he knows her, studies her, memorizes the shapes of her features, the timbres of her voice, the trails of her soul; he knows what she’s about to do almost before she does it, so when she presses herself back against the wall only to lunge forward, he’s already in the process of side-stepping out of the way, not to let to her leave of course, but to give her enough leeway room that she doesn’t feel as trapped or caged as she has probably felt for the past few months. he’s not here to scare her, not here to hold her down, tie her to himself by duty or rule, by tether or bone– he knows that’s not the way to catch a bird like sung mina, that’s not the way to admire the skyful of stars lurking in her skin. that’s something he knows that the enemy never could, and that’s why they couldn’t have gleaned anything from her, through torture or isolation or despair. she’s a wide horizon, the scope and breadth of her larger and stronger than anything they could have ever hoped to kill, and that’s why she’s here, that’s why she could rescue herself, why she could topple any mountain and conquer any feat. that’s why jaewon glows for her and would never bring himself to hold her back.

but this is not her finest moments, and he does follow her the few steps that she makes before crumbling to the ground, her knees wobbling and thin, her legs destroyed to point of atrophy, the sinew withered and raw, bones protruding in all acute, sharp angles, and he watches her tumble and mutter, his palms outstretched to the ready, his eyes dark and aching, bottomless. he approaches her carefully even without the threat of her scalpel, his wounded apple-pie girl, the roots of her tree-stuck-sturdiness bending and waning in ways he never wants to see from her, and he slowly descending down behind her to scoop her up into his arms. she’s frail and fragile and he tries not to think about how small her body is as he fits her against him, makes himself a house around her, makes himself a bonfire, simmering and warm, his scarred arms gently curling around her lightly, the hint of freedom still available should she shove him away and decide he’s still only a mirage.

“i can’t promise you’re not dead, i’m not even sure i’m not dead yet, i’m not sure this isn’t hell. but you’re with me and i’m with you.” he leans away from her a bit to brush her mangly, grungy hair from her face, his hand weathered and worn from a lifetime of fires and mistreatment, his touch only rough-edged and sour, like rest of his body, like his heart, like his voice, like his future. “i’m here, mina, i’ve got you. it’s okay.”

she hesitates in his arms longer than he would like her to, her grip on herself and her emotions clamping down over her countenance, freezing the atmosphere around her, tensing her air into a tight string, the sound of their heartbeats threading between them uncomfortably, his chest near her back. he wants to see her face, almost desperately, almost hopelessly, like every moment from here on out is hinging on this moment, as though she holds the key to the next ten years of his life in the palm of her hand, the next move entirely up to her– and he supposes it sort of is. he can’t step any closer to her, he can’t admit anything else, his tongue will not let him, his feet will not let him, the ghosts howling in his ears won’t let him. happiness is for other people, right?

but when she does turn around, the feeling that spreads through his veins is not a new one, it’s not unfamiliar, though it rings quite painful just the same, unexpected just the same, because it reminds him of harvest, it reminds him of midnight stargazing and playful arguments in barnyards, mina teaching him how to ride a horse, mina singing along with a banjo, mina laughing as the lights dance around her head, and jaewon just staring, staring, staring. he could stare at her for an eternity, he could harbor her footsteps in his ears, the scent of her shampoo in his nose, the silk of her hair on his fingers, forever if she asked him to. they don’t belong together, they don’t belong to each other, but he’d set the whole sky on fire if it meant he could show her the stars once more.

once upon a time, he’d learned a song on a guitar, played it for her, a love song, a confession song, raw, untangled emotions vibrating from the instrument, from his lips, from his eyes, as clear as he could possibly bring himself to be, and she hadn’t reacted. she won’t react this time as well, he’s sure of it, and he’s already resigned himself to stepping away, to retreating back into the navigation room, back into the darkness, back into the haze of booze and solitude and self-torture, the flames of his history licking at his soul, eating him alive.

when she steps forward though and grabs at him, he almost flinches, thinking she’s about to hit him again, the muscles in his neck straining, the air in his lung suspended, gold eyes widening just a hair, positive he’s about to receive another lashing.

but this… this is a different sort of hurt. she reels him in and presses them together like mismatching jigsaw pieces she’s urgent to force in unison, their lips colliding, their teeth colliding, and jaewon loses his balance for a moment, his feet stumbling to uphold him, his hands reaching out again for stability. and they find her. his grip makes purchase on her hips a little too tightly, his breathing hitching as the space between them disappears, and everything warm and confusing floods through him and around him, eyelids fluttering shut as he leans into her. his head tilts, his hands slide around her further, and before he knows it, he’s got her in a cage of his own arms, his limbs winding around her to clutch them together, fingers knotting in her hair on the back of her head, his lips sucking and nipping at hers until she opens her mouth wider, until she lets him in, until he can taste the heat of her tongue, until it fills his head, makes him dizzy.

he kisses her like she’s air and he’s drowning, drowning in this moment, drowning in this hallway, in the middle of space, in the middle of the night; he kisses her like she is every star in the sky, the ones he’s named and the ones he still wants to explore. he kisses her the way holy men kiss altars– full of devotions and prayers and hopes and distraught– kisses her the way battleships kiss dry land, the way suns kiss planetary horizons, the way he’s dreamed of kissing her since he’d first realized he was in love with her, a hundred, thousand years ago. he kisses her like it’s the last thing he’ll ever do.

and when there’s no more breath in his lungs, he breaks the connection for just a moment, opting instead to press his forehead against hers, but keeps her body flush up against his, tight within the bars of his arms, contained like the stars he aches to touch. “i… i guess not.”

the dream that night still holds a whisper of howling, still stings with shrapnel and shell-shock, still tastes vaguely of charred corpses and nausea and heat-sickness, but those are voices on the wind, those are melting backdrops to the main scene of jaewon sitting and counting stars from the fields sprawling outwards from mina’s backyard. at first he thinks he’s alone, but then mina is there of course ( because what sort of dream would it be without her and what sort of visit to harvest would exclude her? ) but sometimes she’s sitting over on the other side of the blanket, giving the stars some ridiculous names, and then other times she’s nestled up against his chest, soft and warm and scented in vanilla and apples and peace. and it’s stressful for him because occasionally soohyuk is there, with dark, beady eyes and sharp cheekbones, staring at them in betrayal and hatred, and jaewon isn’t supposed to be enjoying himself so much whenever she’s leaning back against him like this, and he knows he has to hide it, but it’s becoming more and more difficult to do so each time the scene shifts back and forth. he’s only able to hold her whenever soohyuk blips out of existence but he can’t ever predict when the asshole is about to come back, so he’s left scrambling again and again and again, and at some point he honestly just wishes he were having a dream about the war, just to be straight-forward about it at least.

when he wakes up, it’s because of his own movement, his arms reaching out as he shifts forward and twists, his body already knotted and wrapped around and between the blankets and the girl, and he can’t tell whether her arms are winding over him or if his are winding over her, but they are tied together via the sheets. and even as he rolls over on top of her, the instinct to cling tighter, more securely, to touch more of her skin, to absorb more of her heat, to bury himself in the scent of her hair and her neck and her pillows, he doesn’t realize anything is amiss about it, landing his torso on top of her and cuddling down against her, his fingers curling into her clothing and the fabric, his muscles relaxed and exhausted at the same time. the dream still sits hazy on the tip of his mind, the desperation still tingling in his mouth; the need for touch, the need for connection.

he doesn’t realize– until it’s too late, until his lips part, until the gut-seated urge breaks through walls and walls of mountain-thick resistance and he grazes the edges of his teeth over the sensitive skin of the nape of her neck, his bite soft and drowsy and hungry for something else, something more carnal.

and that’s of course exactly when everything snaps into sharpened focus, his soul jolting back into his body, his senses rising on high alert, the lightning zapping through him in absolute dread, because there’s no way– there’s just no way she wasn’t awake for that, no way to salvage that misstep, that mistake, that breach of the unspoken contract set between them. friendship. uncomplicated. platonic. his body damn near solidifies as he gets whatever grip he can on the bedding beneath them and pushes himself off her, gold eyes wide and piercing and terrified.

harper is glad when her words and actions pull amusement from mina, thereby acquiring the intended results. she grins back at the other woman for a moment longer, before they both seem to fall back into the behaviour that is currently needed to guide and steer the rest of the crew around. she listens calmly to what mina has to say about the subject, considering the people they have and the ones who are currently still capable of working, then straightens a little more as mina turns away.

but when the first mate speaks again, telling her to send anyone over to the bridge if they need anything, she can’t help it. instantly her body straightens again and she makes another salute with a “ma’m, yes, ma’m.” the grin she sports is audible in her tone, but she doesn’t drop her hand from the salute until mina walks off, and then she instantly turns around to head off to her own job.

she doesn’t sneak, nor does she make it too obvious, she simply walks through most of the rooms where people are gathered and takes in their wounds as well as general look. it seems most of them are tired or wounded, but most importantly there is no sign of the chef. so she quietly speaks to a few of the other people that still look capable, inquiring with a few of them whether or not they’d be able to make some food together. when eventually she’s got a set of three headed for the kitchens, she then goes to check on the infirmary.

people are being treated one after the other, the medic more than busy enough with everyone who has suffered injuries from the fight. some of them are like her and will treat their own wounds, most probably, but some of them have no choice other than to let the medic help them out. the wounds are either too bad to treat themselves, or they’re near passing out from loss of blood.

a lot of risks seem to have been taken tonight, and harper kind of grumbles about the aftermath of it - not in the least the fact that their captain is out cold. mina has a point stating that they should go somewhere safe for a while, but then what is safe for a smuggling ship? luckily the first mate sounded like she had an idea, because harper really can’t come up with anything much, honestly.

her feet take her further through the ship, going around, speaking to people, sending those with questions or a want to do something on to mina so she can delegate them to a next step. she’s careful in phrasing her wordings just so that everyone knows harper considers mina to be in charge for now - with no question on that authority. when eventually the food is ready, she makes sure almost everyone manages to get a plate or a bowl, something warm to fill their stomachs, something hearty so they’ll know they’re alive.

and the first mate is not left out of that, of course. harper calmly makes her way over to the bridge herself, a tray in hands on which she’s balancing food for mina as well as the current pilots. she holds it out to the first mate first, of course dipping into a low bow next without even spilling a drop of what’s on the tray. and when she straightens, the grin is back automatically.

“your supper, milady.”

he glides the shirt up over his head and messy mane of dark, unruly hair, careful not to irritate the still-healing gashes on his skin, particularly his back and arms, years worth of snags and sun-scars scarring him even as a child, not to mention the whippings and brand of number seared and charred into his collarbone, the numbers still red and raw, still a wound, still a curse. he was never a slave but he feels a sting of embarrassment from it, knowing he’ll never have to touch a mine or a household appliance but still be seen by the general community as a rat or an escapee; the blaring “192445” announcing his secondhand citizenship on any planet he goes to now, forever haunted by valluria’s barbaric slaving system.

still though, that shame isn’t fully enough to bring him to discomfort in changing right there in the middle of the living room, years and years of a lack of privacy built into his system of understanding, having grown up with a dozen or more other kids, all in one hovel together, no rooms, no beds, no personal space, nothing much more than an abandoned cave with walls and a door. he doesn’t care if the girl speaking to him sees him, doesn’t care what she’s doing or wondering about, only focuses on the fact that these clothes might be the nicest, cleanest things he’s ever worn, and that the pants are slightly too big in the waist– obviously crafted with a well-fed boy in mind.

the fabric hangs off his thin, bony hips, defined ab muscles only formed from extreme exertion under pressure and half-starvation, his figure partially shrouded by the oversized colorful shirt, the buttons and holes on it confusing since he’s never buttoned anything before. he fiddles with the pieces of it for a long while, frowning and glaring down at the strange puzzle that is this shirt, wondering how anyone thought this was a good idea in terms of clothing. in valluria, the apparel and textiles are draped together, tied and fastened in long flowing threads, creating shapes that mirror rays of sunshine and gusts of wind, thought directly of protection against the sands and storms, something these tiny little holes would do nothing for. he struggles with it for what feels like a strained hour.

“that’s fine,” he acknowledges, not voicing his concern that perhaps she’s stalling, perhaps she’s waiting for someone else to come and subdue him, perhaps she’s holding off so that she can poison him and chain him up and sell him to the highest bidder– stop. breathe. he must remind himself he’s not on the desert planet anymore, he’s not alone anymore, the ship is still within running distance, vera had promised she wouldn’t leave without him. she wouldn’t leave without him, right? he sees her set the plate down beside the couch in the corners of his eyes, the small blue, red, and green pieces dotting the ceramic, along with a blob of some brown stuff, and the air inside his lungs tightens, his already-bulging stomach squeezing. “what are those?” they look wet and bulbous– nothing like the dried, fermented types of fruits vallurians eat, and he inches closer to them to sniff and glance up at her, fingers still knotted in all these damn buttons.

“i’m not saying shit because i think you’re going to leave, i know you’re not going to leave.” his voice is a whisper, tentative even as the words themselves bite slightly, sting on their way out his throat, even the option of thinking about mina leaving is painful and unimaginable to them both– for all jaewon’s insecurities, he does really trust her to stay with him. and that’s sort of always been the problem, they are stuck to each other, entrenched in these battles side-by-side even at its most toxic, even at its darkest hour, the once-bright friendship they shared twisting and morphing into something that scratches jaewon’s heart every time their eyes meet. she’d said the word friend and he’d practically bit her, practically threw her down and sliced her open, all his pent up frustration on the matter of being something he wishes he weren’t, of being less than what he wants, that is what is burning between them, and it’s not mina’s fault. he knows that.

she’s more or less correct about one thing though: he’s not hers. she sleeps at night and he’s not there, she eats her breakfast and he’s not there, she burns in the fury of an icy universe, all the stars coalescing in her skin and her eyes and her touch, and he’s not there. smiles like morning sunlight, laughter like a song, vanilla and apples and tree roots reaching deep into the heart of harvest memories, and he’s not a part of that, not a part of her, not held in her atmosphere because she is old enough and strong enough to allow whoever the fuck she wants to be there and disregard whoever the fuck she doesn’t. he says the word ‘mine’ and knows it’s only half true, knows it doesn’t resonate in her the way it does in him, knows she stays with him out of loyalty and duty and reliance and friendship.

and friendship. and friendship. and he needs to figure out how to reconcile himself with that.

“i shouldn’t have hurt you.” again, it’s a murmur, a prayer hushed into the folds of her hair almost soft enough that perhaps she can’t even hear it, the closest he could ever come to an apology, and only for her, only for the girl of his childhood, only for the woman he respects more than anyone else alive, and it’s the truth. he’d lashed out at her yes, but he’d wanted to hurt himself more than anything, and somehow hurting her hurts him and for whatever reason in the navigation room, his fingers pressed to the silk of her skin, their breaths held like promises between them, that had made sense for a hot minute. but the way she’d screamed about soohyuk, about seolhyun, about him– it wasn’t worth it.

it wasn’t worth her crying, something he knows she’s trying to hide, face turned slightly away, lungs hitching between his arms and against his chest, the hurricane of her raining against the metal flooring of the ship curling around them, and he wants to help her stop, wants to keep her intact, as unbreakable as he knows her, wants to wipe them away or at least just not be as useless as he constantly is. but he can’t move, can’t shift out of formation, can’t reach up to her because he is only a tower, he is only a mountain, he is only a sun, scarred and blazing. he’d burn her. like he burns everything else.

so he loosens his hold on her slowly, intending on simply letting her go, letting her retreat back into her room, and he won’t stop her, he won’t call out to her, he won’t bring any of this up in the morning, because that’s how jaewon is for his crew who crumble around him, that’s how he protects them, shields them, saves them, by letting them hurt and fall and stitch themselves back together again in peace. mina is different from everyone else, mina is special, mina is the name carved into every bone on his body, but if she wants to keep her pride, keep her solidarity, keep her emotions to herself, he’ll let her and he won’t drag anything else out of her. he won’t keep her.

before she’s completely out of his grasp though, his body moving away, air flooding in between them, but his hands still on her shoulders, his face still pressed into her hair, he confesses the real answer to the question she’d demanded of him earlier. “i hated soohyuk because he had you. that’s why.” and then he lets her go entirely.

he manages to cough up a laugh, short and gurgly, halfway to a cough he can’t name, something slightly terrifying and reminiscent of a darkness still edging on his vision, still pulling at his seams, still aching in the back of his mind. the movement brings with it pain of course, because everything about life is pain and he is currently walking along the horizons of it, but he still grips and clings to the bed mat below him, nails digging in, teeth clenching tightly, eyes shutting and squeezing against the onslaught, refusing sound to tear through his throat. he doesn’t want to cry out again, doesn’t want to admit this weakness again, the muscles in his neck straining against the force as she makes a joke and then rips his leg open.

he tries not to think about it, tries to remember good pieces and splotches of the war, times when their singing could be heard over the battlements, across the fields of blood and gore, across the planes of death and ghosts, over the wailing, the sobbing, the broken, grey heap of it all. he tries to remember not the ending, shrouded in misery and defeat, misplaced hopes and disappointment stronger than anything jaewon’s ever felt before, but instead on the faith he held for his garrison, for his troops, for his crew. for mina, a comrade in life and in arms. he tries to think about the times she was there, instead of the times she was not, despite her bringing up those very vivid months of worry and fear. “oh come on, mina, you know you’re the only one who could ever shove me and not get in trouble for it, regardless of the situation.” which may or may not be true– he’s not sure. she’s rarely ever done it.

he disagrees with her though, but he doesn’t really want to tell her why, wishes he could see her perspective on the verse around them, wishes he could hold himself to her truths. it’d be nice, if not a little doomed, to think of things with such finality, such certainty. but he falls asleep each night to the screaming in his ears, the howling ghouls and their reaching fingers, each one knowing he belongs with them, each one drenched in the life he lives only because of them, and he wonders if it’s some sort of trade-off to keep death sated for longer. jaewon kills and saves himself, like offers to an old god. borrowed time built on a throne of skulls, all the moments stretched out in front of him of when he should have died but didn’t, of when he could have been lost but wasn’t, from that first memory beside the dumpster, all the way up to now.

yang jaewon is living with a thousand massacres buried deep in his chest, scarring his flesh and riddling his shadow; it’s impossible for him to imagine pieces of him are not already dead.

“maybe it was foolish. but i didn’t have a choice, we wouldn’t have… been able to get out of there without someone taking argent out….” that second is freeze-framed inside his mind, turning the corner, feeling the bullets hit their marks, both from him and from the other man, the reckless seizing of pain, the sudden collapse to the floor, and he knows he’ll be reliving it for years now, the same way he does everything else, the trauma of his history scratching and re-scratching at the tapestry of his life. “and i sure as shit wasn’t about to let one of you assholes take that kind of fall.” and for a moment, he looks up at her with all that same familiar conviction of a captain on fire, determination flooding his veins in the way only yang jaewon can stand, believing his choices to be the right ones, even now on this gurney. mina is important for the ship to survive. his mercenaries protect the merchandise. his crew, his protection. end of story.

he does groan embarrassingly as she tilts him over though, his hands desperate to grab hold of whatever he can manage despite being slippery from the blood and havoc, and shuts his eyes tightly to ignore the way his vision swirls.

his shoulders instinctually hunch slightly at the girl’s mention of dogs, not that he’s particularly fearful of them, just that he knows what they can do to a person, how their teeth rend and sneer, growl louder than anything he can muster up, claw and scratch and dig and dominate. he knows some people domesticate them, has seen the tall, black mutts the overlords tie to leashes and strings, keep barely fed so that when they go out onto the streets, the animals bark and howl, snap and jerk for anything meaty and juicy within reach. jaewon has witnessed little girls mina’s size be torn to bloody, hideous shreds before, back in the alleyways of valluria, has witnessed the speed and determination pumping through their hind legs as they give chase to the wild rats, to the wild cats, to the wild orphan children stealing because they have no other means to survive.

perhaps all manors are the same on every planet– high walls and dangerous creatures and an overabundance of food– even if the inhabitants differ, even if some places house star-bright girls and their headstrong veracity, their domineering offers of friendship.

he doesn’t broach that topic however, doesn’t infringe on it any more, only needing to wait a moment or two longer for her direction to shift, and he nods to the bit about trading. “vera’s brought a lot with her. says she doesn’t like trading in the bigger cities….” he’s not sure she’s heard him though, his voice not carrying enough wait throughout the whitened space between them, not nearly as unabashed or commanding as this girl’s, the way she addresses the couch with its blankets and the kitchen with it’s plates of food, and then she’s gone like a whirlwind.

he’s cold but if there’s one thing he’s learned in his years on the street, scrounging and raking for scraps in the dust, it’s that nothing is as important as food and chances to eat so much come in far and few between, his naturally built patterns of behavior infused inside every bone of his body, so as soon as she disappears, he turns from the couch and hurriedly collects everything he can manage on the kitchen counter into one spot before him. he considers simply stuffing his pockets and making a run for it, racing back to the ship and hiding in one of its many metal corners, but that might insight the girl to anger and he doesn’t know how powerful she is yet, he doesn’t know how much trade and workings vera might have with her or her family. and deliberately sabotaging possible connections for his new contraband aboard their own spaceship and possibly getting his ass kicked off, isn’t exactly how he’d intended on starting off this interstellar traveling.

but he has to do something with all this food, he can’t simply ignore it and he can’t put it all inside his clothes– she’s about to take them off him and dry them somewhere, exchange them for something else, so that won’t do him any good. his anxiety is rising high just from the thought of it. so by the time she comes tumbling on back down the steps, he’s in the midst of stuffing his mouth with as much of it as he possibly can, whatever is edible, whether he likes it or not, chewing through it quickly and swallowing painfully, disregarding his own comfort for the satisfaction that he won’t be hungry later. as soon as she’s in eyesight though, he steps away from the counter, cheeks near to bursting, determination coloring his face and his dark eyes as he stands his ground and devours the last of it, grimacing yet triumphant.

“that’ll fit.” he steps up to her and takes the clothes, hoping she didn’t see too much just now, and stepping over to the couch to lay them all out flatly across the back of the furniture. even if it doesn’t fit, it wouldn’t matter, he’ll wear it anyway; beggars can’t be choosers and he’s never been one to complain. as it is though, the clothes look immaculate– not a tear or a stain on them at all, and for a moment all he can do is stare, before yanking off his own shirt carefully, mindful not to upset the still-healing lashes on his back and arms, the dark gashes lining his muscles and spine all the way from his neck to his tailbone like inverted wings, memories of the slaver’s whip still stinging as the cloth slides over them.

yang jaewon, the broken boy, the lost rat, all vulturous gold and char-burned black, both brimming with sun-hued rays of burning light and a darkness mirroring the space between stars, whispering of deaths and finalities and regrets; he paints himself in the mesh of both ideals because he must, because someone has to, because this is the only way he knows survival, this is the only place he understands meaning. sand-scarred and venomous, he cascades into the bed beside her, pours himself over the warmed sheets as though he’s never slept on a bed before, and he knows it’s not much and he shouldn’t be so grateful for it, but sleeping alone holds its own demons, and he’s not strong enough to combat them all right now. the war howls in his ears, itching at the wounds in him, drowns in puddles on the floor of his bedroom, and he’d rather stay awake all night long than go back there– which he knows she wouldn’t want him to do.

he buries his face in the bedding she allows for him, thankful for the darkness covering what he hopes is indistinguishable despite her sharp sight; the way her scent affects his body, the way he rubs his nose and cheeks and lips over the linen, eyes pressed closed, pinning himself down so that he doesn’t reach for her. he comes here for salvation and torment, for her calming presence and the aching temptation, something in their combined atmosphere bringing him to an almost comfortable agony. he always wants to touch her, but he always holds back, allowing himself only this, only the bare minimum of her voice in his ear, the midnight playing on his fantasies.

he pulls the blanket up over himself and settles, still cold but better now, careful not to bump into her or infringe too much on her space, hoping the lines of her will act as a dreamcatcher as they drift off together in their separate subconsciousness. he falls asleep thinking about what it’d taste like kissing her goodnight.