sacrilege

« I RE-MADE YOU, SHIM CHANGMIN. »

she was never known for being comforting. that is, jung soojung doesn’t begin to know way or how to. what she could do for him after all these years, short of being there—she doesn’t know. rather, she was never equipped with the knowledge, the how-tos, the teachings. 

no, prior to shim changmin, the renegade knew nothing of compassion, guilt, mercy. and even so, now, now—even if she felt things a human not a girl raised for war feels—even now, she hadn’t a single clue as to what to do.

what her heart will do with constant ache, twist, clench in correspondence to every empty stare, pale scar, and bouts of hallucinations.

what can she do for shim changmin?

“i came to see you.” the answer is soft, simple enough that it would have sufficed. soojung didn’t bother with any other explanation—it wasn’t a lie after all—fingers squeezing his slightly. 

“am i not welcome?” 

it is but an useless quip. made to draw the slightest of humor back into her tone. soojung is well aware of the dulling alarms in the background, masked by the pour of rain and the beat of her heart. 

                  effortlessly, still.                   even with just a simple touch.

but normalcy, in this case, was something they both needed.

“let’s go in.” she tugs him into with practiced ease, sharp eyes flicking over his features. changmin didn’t need to be told twice, she’s aware, more compliant than not in this state of mind. still, soojung offers an excuse, anyhow. allows the slightest bit of shiver to run up her spine.

“it’s cold.”

normalcy, in this case, (a hard pill to swallow in the face of reality) meant acting as if they actually had a choice in the matter.

comfort comes with her answer, with the touch she’s always offered so freely. if anything has remained with him over the years it is the feeling of her fingertips on his skin; the sound of her breath in the quiet—in the most deafening cacophonies of war. it is the look in her eyes when she’s watching him, as if he’s something more than an old, faded shell—worthy of the lucid and unflinching devotion she shows him.

he couldn’t dream of anything more.

“you are.” he pushes the words out on an exhale, dark eyes scanning their surroundings before landing on her. changmin catches her shiver, knows as well as he is standing there, in that moment—that it is something she’s let slip through. the thought brings a smile to his lips, though it never quite reaches, “okay.”

before her, he’s a beast without claws—without teeth, without bone.

disarmed. vulnerable.

he lifts their joined hands to press a kiss to her curled fingertips, lashes fluttering in the ever-strengthening onslaught of rain. his body, already ill-fit for the conditions, shakes minutely. if only they could see him now. lieutenant nam jaehyun; cold, bitter, and hateful—hopelessly in love with a pretty little mutant.

no, that’s not right.

first class brotherhood member, shim changmin—deathly allergic to being cold and wet. forcefully, he grounds himself into that reality, brows furrowing in consternation as he turns his focus outward. his focus falls on her petite form with all the strength he can muster, as he leans in to kiss her temple.

for a moment, he can’t move—caught in the wild clenching of his heart. she’s here.

“let’s go.”

as it was, there was bits and pieces of her life that she would never get back. 

soojung knows this well, comforts herself with the notion that this is how life is. this is how it’s supposed to be. this is her family’s legacy, broken. this is remnants of her youth, shackled. this is a cage. a boot on her windpipe pressing down, relenting just enough for her to breathe. 

however shallow, however pained.

                                                                                                                          this is mercy.

it is with such conviction that she carries on through life. however shamed, however pathetic way of living it was—it was still living. it was still waking up in the morning and seeing her siblings, her mother, the love of her life.  

yes, shim changmin, however broken, however twisted, was here now.

and however much she hated this way of living—cowardly and contemptible as it is—didn’t matter in the slightest with this very fact. if she fought, if she resisted, she wouldn’t even have this. 

mercy.

it is but a foul bitter taste on her tongue. one that she bites through regardless, if only for the fact that the consequences of not complying meant the loss of everything she’s ever cared for. and her soul, her heart, her mind, her body — it can’t take any more blows.

the journey to the lower levels is tedious. almost painstakingly long in the beginning. soojung had not completely understood why he had insisted on getting his own place—but given the fact that she shared her apartment with her brother, it wasn’t as if she was going to demand otherwise.

and who shim changmin is now—she doesn’t know how to help him.

                                                                                                                    she barely knows him.

“changmin?” her voice rings clear over the city’s alarm, head tilted to the slightest degree as she regards the male before her. still. frozen. the slightest tremble to his frame is heart-wrenching. near frightening, had jung soojung ever been the type to use such datives to a man she knows like second skin.

but this wasn’t the man she knew.

this was the shell of a man that threatened to break. and soojung? soojung wasn’t sure if she could keep him together.

mercy.

her fingers slide over his palm easily, squeezing his hand.

“changmin.”

is that what this is?

it had always been difficult to line the pieces up, to complete the mental puzzle of his place in the world—of who he was—for all the frayed and jagged edges. difficult, but not impossible. though lately, his day to day experience had become little more than trying to put together little more than shards with broken fingers.

his lips moved even then, whispering to the shadows insisting he was that traitourous human—that as sure as he felt the licking of flames at his heels, he was bound by blood, sweat and tears to those soldiers walking the streets. he shared their mission.

they wouldn't hurt him, would they?

just how long had he stood out there? tempting fate?

he heard her before anything else; deliberately loud footsteps in the dead silence—yet just as light and airy as he remembered, when she didn't care to mask her presence. too often, it was in their humble apartment that he'd listen to her roam, crawling into the corner of the couch like some overgrown cat.

the memory drew to mind with it a stark sense of unease. his gut churned, eyes flicking wildly along the exterior of the building before falling to meet hers. blankly, he watched the shift of her brows into a soft downward slope—listened to the dull pounding of rain on the asphault. but beneath it all, he could hear each breath, carefully steady. patient.

But suddenly she’s all I know, an old refrain

                       "the midnight curfew for all mutant residents is now in effect. you are asked to return to your homes and remain there until—” bzzz.“the midnight curfew for all mutant residents is now in effect. officers will detain individuals found to be in violation—” bzzz. bzzzz.

—detainees will be subject to capital punishment under statute 141.04, subpart C of the mutant containment act. but you know that, don’t you, lieutenant nam jaehyun?

we have the right to kill you where you stand.

the television flickered, signal cut—bright blues and oranges; bars of black and white replacing the images of old faces and older memories staring at him from the other side of the dirty window. overhead, the neon ‘electronics shop’ sign gave one last spark before fizzling out, giving way to the cold, weary sort of darkness that fell in such places. what remnants of life the night had held in the hours before were now—perhaps thankfully—silent.

and changmin was left with only his ghosts for company, running shaky fingertips through the cropped hair at his nape. worn boots scruffed the ground, scattering raindrops across the dampening concrete. the rain fell in sheets; long waves across alleyways, in the cracks where the light failed to reach and the bodies littered the ground in drug-driven hazes.

he could've been tempted into that life himself, if it didn't promise to make things so much worse. he was no glutton for giving the voices in his head more leeway to speak—for turning the volume up on old delusions.

bzzz.

you know the punishment for violating curfew, lieutenant nam.

no, that was wrong. changmin. it was changmin. it had been changmin for as long as memory served; as familiar as the scars embedded into his skin in the mornings; as the humble auto-shop he stood beside, well past the time that he should've hidden himself away and waited out the night like everyone else.

so why are you outside, jaehyun?

He could swear she’s real more often than not—but the mind is a tricky thing, and his has learned all the best ways to cope with the agony. It shows him glimpses; a familiar figure in the shadows, low-heeled boots on the damp concrete floor and a dark-eyed stare that takes him back to the festivals of Japan in February; filled with nervousness and something he likes to tell himself was love.

It’s equal parts torture and delight; fuel for the escapist in him that imagines he’s beyond the prison walls and free to search for everyone he’d been forced to leave behind.

But chances are there’s no one left.

He could swear sometimes that he hears her voice, in the depths of the rusted aluminum tubs filled to the brim with ice water. His head dips below the surface, and before his ears pop, he hears it—her first words to him, her last, and everything in between; her laughter, her sadness, her derision ring sweet and low—

And then he’s yanked from the waters with thick calloused hands in his hair, tearing at his scalp as a murmured voice plays back promises—we’ll kill you one day, Jaehyun; when you have nothing left to give us—like a broken record. Changmin watches the shadows dance across the wall with glassy, reddened eyes; horned figures trudging to the door until the piercing sound of metal dragging on the concrete marks his solitude.

The shivers last throughout the night, undeterred by the thin, worn blanket tossed across his shoulders or the torn pants hanging from narrow, bony hips. In the silence, he counts the nicks in his shackles and sings raspy tunes under his breath—

When he runs out, he sings Happy Birthday.

And it doesn’t matter that it isn’t February—it’d be colder—or October—it’d be cold still; the melody draws forth another beat to the tired organ in his chest. The pads of his fingers play across chipped, cold concrete while the knot in his throat grows, until each syllable fades into a pause.

The pauses grow until his eyes fall closed, and the shivers make waves up and down his spine.

Before he falls into the illusions of sleep, Changmin listens for the sound of breath—for the shuffling of low-heeled boots, or the whisper of black fabric sliding over soft skin.

It had been years since the last time he awoke beside a stranger—that stranger had in fact been his wife, before they’d exchanged anything more than dirty looks over half-eaten pastries and edged words—but when morning comes, in the rising of light from beneath the horizon ( the hazy gray-greens of dewy mist ) and through the bedroom window, he knows.

The warm, naked body at his side isn’t the one he’s accustomed to.

—spent the better half of his life worshipping with fingers and lips and thoughts—

Alarm jolts him from the space between dream and reality; to the waking world and the panic that creeps in with it. His eyes flutter open, his fingers twitch at his sides and Shim Changmin takes in his surroundings with all the focus of a battle-hardened soldier ( and it doesn’t matter that he has two beautiful kids and thirty-eight years to his name, that aspect of him never changes ) before he chances a look at his bed companion.

It isn’t his room—

But the softened features of an young woman—no more than eighteen—; dark hair framing a strong, beautiful jaw; darker eyes opening to stare back at him with a strange mixture of amusement and confusion, leave him with no option but to stare.

And that’s what he does, laying in a long-abandoned apartment in a city decimated by battle after battle. A peeking of the bright yellow wall in the living room catches his eye even as soft tones break the silence—he remembers this.

On the mental calendar of days that Shim Changmin wished he could change ( or even just relive ), it was the third; behind the deaths of his parents, and the moment he’d left Miyoung to protect a man who didn’t begin to deserve their loyalty. It was a simple day, where he’d done little more but read an old novel and take out the trash—instead of indulging in his girlfriend ( and her beautifully teenage hormones ), he’d gone to bed—

And war had arrived on their doorstep in the morning.

When her words reach him, accompanied with the play of slender fingers across the curve of his spine, he decides not to question it.

“What do you want to do today?”

She doesn’t expect a response. Some part of him wonders just how much the time has changed him that he supplies one, tucked between faint kisses to her temple, “Let’s just stay in bed.”

His arms slip around her waist, closing the meager distance between them until there’s nothing but warmth and the steady thrumming of a heartbeat against his own—or maybe not so steady. With a smile, Changmin listens to her hum; feels the pressing of lips against his shoulder.

“I thought you were against being too lazy.”

Of course, she has to be wry about it.

But even the tiniest curving of her lips is infectous.

“I never said we’d be resting.”

It was, after all, the last day they’d have together—Jeju would be gone tomorrow, and with it, the little world they’d created where it was possible to waste away the hours reading an old book and taking out the trash.

the first time that he realized it wasn’t such a great idea was as he hauled too many boxes ( bearing his few belongings ) up three flights of stairs. being fit didn’t prepare anyone for the mind-numbling tediousness of moving, and shim changmin was no exception. though, instead of complaining, he deposited his things in the living room with the rest of their collective junk and descended again to rinse and repeat.

the second time, unfortunately, came with a close call. confronted with a mysteriously blank expression when he peered inside the bathroom ( jung soojung never yelped ). the brotherhood member obeyed when all of his survival instincts told him to back away slowly from the woman grasping at the edges of the toilet.

as she pushed herself up, he turned and departed as fast as he’d arrived -- though he could’ve sworn he’d put the lid down just ten minutes before.

the third time, he found himself staring at a canary yellow wall ( it’d come with the apartment, apparently ) while trying to process her declaration without letting his amusement be known, “i don’t think accent walls come in black.” changmin tapped his forearm with his fingers, making a steady rhythm of it before sparing a glance at his girlfriend, curious.

her gaze, on the brightly colored wall behind where their sofa would be, never moved.

“i don’t like this wall.”

the first time he felt certain it was the right thing to do ( after the pounding in his chest, after the contagiousness of her tiny smiles and the thought of her body pressed to his every morning, and every night, without interruption ) came with the slide of her fingertips down his palm, no sooner than he’d locked the door.

their door.

changmin smiled to himself for the thousandth time, feeling her lips pressing against his jaw while warm breath fanned across his skin. it was no feat for her to set his mind on a different path--“you know we’re supposed to christen each room, right?”

some things were better kept to himself. he’d known it once upon a time; had lived on that very reasoning for the sake of survival where ( and when ) it was common for lives to be placed under a microscope of the entertainment of others. it was how he’d always thought of it, stuffed into a tiny room in an underground base, once upon a time--when all the solutions seemed so straight-forward.

a war could be won by effort, salvation was more than a pipe dream, and a heart could be mended without leaving gaps behind--

empty spaces that he felt more acutely with each passing day. no matter how relieved he felt ( how ecstatic ), the feeling only reached certain spaces; others remained dark, secluded and lonely--filled with all his worst nightmares and all his best dreams.

in some ways, it was more painful to be confronted with the reality of their lives. they were together, trapped birds in a cage with nowhere else to go. he didn’t know how to make jung soojung happy; didn’t know how to be happy himself. maybe he’d never known, or maybe the ability had been ripped from his hands years ago.

maybe he’d never had it.

“i’m sorry.”

standing at the foot of her bed, bearing the marks of a cruel, unforgiving world, he could feel it. the clenching of his chest, while his pulse thundered in his ears; the dull sting of his fingernails digging into his palm, as he stared at the rumpled sheets ( instead of the dark, loving eyes trained on him from the pillows ) and swallowed around knots.

the words had become lost, somewhere along the way.

but he’d be lying if he said she didn’t have a way of peering into him anyways. maybe she knew it was coming; maybe she’d understand, and he could stop--

before he disappointed them both.

“i don’t know if i can do this.” he lingered there, caught speechless by his own declaration. only then did the uncertainty come spilling out; a flood of shaky breaths and backpedaling steps toward the door. cool air at his back ( shirtless, exposed; his feet caught on the loosened legs of his jeans, strung about his hips and riding low, haphazard ) stopped him short.

it wasn’t the fact that he’d been rendered bare by something as simple as showing his skin ( marred and scarred and broken ); it wasn’t her face. not her face--

he couldn’t look at her when he was almost certain he was snapping in two; divided by happiness and fear ( for failure ).

“i don’t know if i can make you happy, soojung.”

You look good in leather -- in bars Breaking things, breaking hearts You look good in pleasure -- in hotels Loneliness is the key to break that spell I am terrified

the ringing of the hotel phone pierced the silence. dark lashes fluttered as changmin awoke from a daze--a half sort of sleep that threatened to consume him while he wandered his own thoughts--and took in the gentle light of morning coming through the window. ring. ring. ring. releasing a faint, exasperated breath, the male only barely registered the vague warmth of a body at his side in the warm summer morning; soft skin pressed to his side, and then his back, as he turned to pick up the phone and listen to the receptionist rattle off the time.

"i didn't ask for a wake up call." his voice caught in disuse, he spoke and then promptly slipped the receiver back on the hook--

as though the sound had broken a spell, a rustling in the sheets took his attention back to the young woman. he watched in silence--the enraptured sort--as bright brown eyes opened--as thought she'd been asleep--to stare back at him. though perhaps, he should have known something was wrong as soon as she looked away.

the aversion of her gaze and the shifting of her body went unnoticed.

perhaps, he'd expected their first time together to mean more than what it was. the thought was promptly discarded. naked, warm and drawing his attention in much the way she always had, jung soojung begged his focus--his physical being--to remain on her; whether in violence and passion and that much...

that much he'd accepted.