;description: a companion piece to this  ;tw: blood

you swore no one will see you bleed. like sharks they will encircle you at any sign of weakness, yet they both saw you bathed in it like you’ve been baptized where people are reborn only to die and die again.

“How long ago?” Her arms crossed in front of her. “Back when we tried to find Qiu some matches? Or back even further? Like… When you were choking me when we first met then left me to fend for myself in that dark house?”

The assault of questions thrown at him hopefully distanced him enough from her. He was getting awfully close to the walls she carefully set up over long toiling years and she didn’t like it. At least one of those questions had to succeed at throwing him off course and distracting him. 

“Ahh…” Mei Ling looked away quickly. Eye contact was not an ideal thing right now. Not when her face lit up over how dumb that sounded. Those couldn’t have been her words. She rested her chin in her hand and ran through the archives of her mind for this memory. Something like this should stick out like a sore thumb when all her other memories on the island involved either killing or avoiding getting killed. 

“Are you sure that was me?” 

Jongin peaks at the resonance of footsteps and maybe it’s foolish of him to recognize their familiarity enough to conclude the owner of them to be of no threat to him. In this world, everything is a threat, he thinks. Some are just easier to face than others and Tao, with his calculation lingering on every footstep, his unbridled grace despite destruction, is the easiest and simultaneously the hardest he’s shouldered for the sake of unnamed things. Attachment living, feeding off of a scathing ambiguity. What nourishment is there to find among the ruins of a boy? A cant of the head, diminutive sunlight filtering through the curtain of lashes after persuading itself through the canopy of foliage above their heads; it’s sympathetic of the sun to find purchase on the undeserving, to feel its warmth prickle over his jawline. Such a reassuring touch as his lips fissure at the corners, then settle into a practiced nothingness. 

「 mwxtao​ 」 

Mei Ling couldn’t believe there was a group. 

There was an actual group of people traipsing around the run down neighborhood she chose to scavenge for supplies. After what felt like a couple of hours, she remembered why she hated going into these areas. They were way too populated for comfort. She could hardly handle one or two people coming at her, defending herself from a group was out of the question. Within a small hamper, she contorted herself so she would fit snuggly inside. All she did in there was pray that they wouldn’t come into this house specifically, and listen into their incessant blabber. 

Once the voices completely rescinded into the distance to where she felt safe enough to exit the hamper, she grabbed her bag of newly acquired material and headed out. A firm hand ran through her hair with a strong sense of irritation. The moon and stars already came out and shone brightly against the nightly backdrop. She couldn’t go back to her hideout now when her eyes weren’t sharp enough to catch potential dangers. 

At that time she came to terms with her fate that she had to spend the night here.

With a heavy heart, she closed the front door after getting inside again. She thought about moving the old table in front of the door to prevent outsiders from coming in, but decided to keep it open in case she needed to make a quick escape. The sooner she went to sleep, the sooner she could wake up and get out of this forsaken place. 

Funny enough, surprisingly the thought of sleeping in a real bed after such a long period got her a little excited. This wasn’t the same type of excitement that came when she found new clothes or food. This type of excitement stemmed from the anticipation of feeling like an actual human. Not a contestant, or a mutant, or an orphan. 

Hands are crucial, grabbing onto wrists, his throat on fire when oxygen comes in trickles and he needs floods. Selfish man, turning pale. Chest a city consumed by flames, young lungs struggling and this is a tragedy where everyone dies because of one person’s mistakes. It’s a fist fight without fists, malice written between teeth when the offender smiles and Kai is just hopeless enough to think it’s something admirable; when violence supersedes pleasure, these are the monsters in story books and they’re horrifying, they’re stunning. 

He hates how he can’t see himself ever being one of them. 

Then he grunts, mind on his blade left in overgrown switchgrass fields. It’s close but not close enough, screaming at the edge where lush green gives way to rock. His sneakers fumble on the surface, they don’t know how to stay leveled on stone without solitude keeping his soles in tact and maybe he’s going to die with his knotted fingers trembling in the cotton of a stranger’s shirt. 

Step back, there’s no ground. 

He’s floating and floating and the hand cranes into his jaw to keep him upright, everything washed in saline vapor, in warmth; the tears wash soot from their skin and he thrashes. Hands are crucial and they curl into wrists, dull nails into flesh, desperation delving into bones. He wants to live but doesn’t know what for, everything balanced on ocean tendrils, lapping at the cape. It calls out for him when he threatens to plummet and there’s an image; body breaking with white peaks, he’d be beautiful and dead like everything he’s ever cherished and he knows he doesn't deserve it. He has no breath to say these words, that he wants to be bruised and ugly, tear him apart limb from limb but anything other than a plea before a fall. Confirmation consumed by the abyss. The gulls would sing him a concerto. Maybe the stones would take him if he’s lucky, splitting the cranium on collision but it’s too quick and he’s a romantic colored in regret. Choking, the clarity fades. 

If he were certain, he’d say, past a shoulder, his salvation stood proud on its feet. Parallel lines and vacuity more beautiful than he could’ve ever fathomed. This isn’t a monster nor is it a hero —