{ chapter fifteen

Jongin realises his jaw has gone slack and Taemin has released him to cover his own face. The entire arena is silent, stunned, but Junmyeon’s loud sobbing is clear and sharp in everyone’s ears.

“Human,” the King says, breaking the silence, “the Sea is poisoned with your presence. I know you are here. You have witnessed the consequences of your foolish actions – this is what happens when the Surface meets the Sea. Learn from this tragedy.”

Jongin is quivering all over – in fear, in rage, in horror. With every passing moment the realisation submerges Jongin deeper and deeper into despair – Kyungsoo’s unmoving body will never rise from the sand again.

“All of you are dismissed,” he finishes. The King turns and swims out through the trapdoor, followed by the guards with tridents, and Junmyeon immediately sinks to the ground, weeping. He scoops up his lifeless brother and bends over him, sobbing into his body, gasping his name in a feeble attempt to bring Kyungsoo back. The remaining guards hover over him, allowing him a few moments alone, before they take his elbows and pull him up, escorting him from the arena. He resists for a moment, before realising that he’s in public, and bows his head respectfully as the guards take him away. None of them stop to collect Kyungsoo’s body.

Jongin finally finds the strength to move and yanks himself from Jonghyun’s weak grip, kicking his legs hard and swimming down to the arena. His breaths are sharp and shallow, panic rising as he approaches Kyungsoo. The departing citizens stop and stare, but Jongin takes no notice of them.

He kneels down beside Kyungsoo and lifts him from the ground, crying out as his body slumps in his arms. Jongin’s tears blur his vision and the emotions swamp him all over again – he finally begins crying, holding Kyungsoo close to him, denying the reality before him.

“No,” he sobs, “Kyungsoo, no, no…”

He feels his Jonghyun and Minho’s presence behind him, the two friends placing their arms around his shoulders to comfort him.

“I’m here, Kyungsoo. It’s me,” Jongin whimpers. “Kyungsoo, please wake up, please…”

“Jongin!” he hears Taemin cry. A wave of water from the pounding of Taemin’s tail blows Jongin’s hair forward as Taemin swims over. “Jongin, wait! It’s not too late!”

Jongin lifts his head and turns around as Taemin skids to a halt before them. Jonghyun and Minho look just as confused as Jongin feels, and Taemin scoops Kyungsoo into his arms, breathing hard.

“The folktale,” he gasps, “the folktale, it’s not too late, it’s not too late…”

Jongin and Jonghyun are still confused, but Minho’s face alights with realisation, and he inhales sharply, pushing himself upwards.

Taemin throws Kyungsoo over his shoulder and tells Minho to bring Jongin up, before turning around and swimming off quickly, out of the arena. Jongin gets up to follow him, but Minho has already seized his arms, and is pulling him along, propelling them both with the immense strength of his tail.

“Help me, Jonghyun!” Minho calls, ducking his head and gritting his teeth as he pushes himself to swim as fast as he can, weighed down by Jongin’s feeble kicking. Jonghyun quickly catches up and latches onto Jongin’s other arm, their speed increasing dramatically with his help.

“What’s the folktale?” Jongin asks, taken aback by the sudden turn of events. There are still tears in his eyes and his voice is shaking, but Taemin’s words echo in his head: it’s not too late.

“I’ll—explain later,” Minho grunts.

“Is he going to survive?”

“Don’t get your hopes up,” Jonghyun says. He obviously understands Taemin’s epiphany, as his face is now determined, his eyes reflecting the way his mind reels in comprehension.

Jongin falls silent. His head is spinning and the world is blurring past in fast-moving colours, but he clings onto Taemin’s promising words and prays they’ll reach their destination soon.

A few minutes of silence pass, and only when they enter isolated waters and continue swimming upwards does Jongin realise they’re going to the Surface.

When they reach close proximities to the air, Minho finally slows down, and Jonghyun follows suit. Jongin watches frantically as Taemin swims away, with Kyungsoo still slumped over his shoulder, and Minho motions for him to continue.

“We can’t breathe up there yet,” he explains. “Follow Taemin. Stay close to Kyungsoo. Keep him away from the Sea.”

“What? Why?”

“Taemin will explain. Go. Hurry,” Jonghyun urges.

Frightened, Jongin swims off to follow Taemin to the Surface, forgetting to say goodbye to his friends. He watches as Taemin breaks the Surface and kicks as hard as he can, desperate to reach him.

When he breaks the barrier and gasps the harsh Surface air, coughing the salt water from his lungs, Jongin realises it’s late and the darkness has already settled. He catches up to Taemin quickly now that they’re swimming on the Surface, and clambers onto the rock shelves, helping his friend haul Kyungsoo up and out of the water.

“Jongin,” Taemin pants, clutching onto the rocks and ducking his head to catch his breath. “Listen to me. You have to—you have to be quick.”

“With what?”

Taemin pulls himself as close to the rocks as he can while Jongin cradles Kyungsoo in his arms, placing his ear against his lips to feel if he’s breathing, but it’s impossible to tell when he’s shaking so much.

“Listen to me,” Taemin repeats breathily. “There was an old folktale. A folktale about a princess that fell in love with a man from the Surface. Her blood was pure, but she—she could breathe on the Surface, because of him. The Surface seeped into her because he loved her enough that—that it was shared between them—”

Jongin places a hand on Kyungsoo’s chest, but he doesn’t feel a heartbeat. However, it’s been at least ten minutes since the execution, and despite his colourless skin, Kyungsoo still isn’t cold…

“What do I do?” Jongin asks, his voice shaking.

“I don’t know,” Taemin replies frantically, “I don’t even know if it’ll work, I don’t know if he’s even alive, but just—take him. Take him away from the Sea. Connect him with the Surface, Jongin, and stay close to him.”

The wind is cold and the air is harsh, and Jongin knows if he wants Kyungsoo to survive, he needs to keep him out of bitter conditions. He nods and hugs Kyungsoo against him, lifting him up into his arms.

“Go,” Taemin urges. “Don’t leave him until he’s stable.”

Jongin stumbles as he runs away, looking back only once, but the darkness hides Taemin’s presence.

When Jongin reaches home, he slams the front door open and staggers inside and into his bedroom, huffing from weariness. He ran all the way to his house from the beach, and he’s exhausted from carrying Kyungsoo the whole way, his heavy tail weighing him down. He drops Kyungsoo down onto his mattress and clutches his knees, taking a moment to regain his breath.

He stares at Kyungsoo’s lifeless body, slumped across his bed, and bursts into tears. He’s alone, with a Mer prince out of water, unknowing of what to do, what to think, how to save Kyungsoo’s life – if possible at all.

Frantic, Jongin turns to try and find something, anything, to help – and his gaze lands on his phone.

There’s only one thing left to do.

His fingers shake as he dials, and the phone rings for what feels like hours before the familiar sleepy voice picks up, obviously disturbed from slumber.

“Hello?”

“Sehun?” Jongin snivels weakly. The opposite line responds with silence, and Jongin hangs his head in shame, sobbing.

“I’m s-scared, Sehun,” he pleads hysterically. “Please, I need your help, please.”

His hands are shaking and he’s close to dropping the phone, and Sehun’s unresponsiveness isn’t making it any easier on him. He feels like a fool for throwing away his friendship with Sehun, for crawling back to him for help after so much rejection, and he’s close to hanging up when Sehun sighs and finally speaks.

“I’m on my way.”

* * *

There’s no traffic late at night, but the taxi driver still takes impossibly long to drive all the way to Jongin’s. Sehun opens Jongin’s front door – unlocked as always – and runs over to his bedroom to help, beginning to stress over how long he’s left his friend alone. What he sees when he opens the door stuns him.

Jongin looks up at him from his kneeling position on the floor, slumped over the edge of the bed, his eyes red-rimmed and puffy. One of his hands wipes his tears, and the other is tightly entwined with another male’s.

But the stranger on the bed isn’t normal. Apart from his limp body and pallid skin, he has a tail in place of a pair of legs.

And Sehun knows it’s not a fantasy.

Jongin scrambles to his feet and throws himself into Sehun’s arm, his body shaking with his sobs, burying his face into his friend’s neck. Sehun finds himself tearing up and he wraps his arms around Jongin’s waist to comfort him, dumbfounded.

“I’m so sorry,” Jongin cries. “I don’t know what to do. I don’t know how to save him.”

Jongin pulls away as fast as he tossed himself into Sehun, and collapses to his knees beside the bed once more. Sehun takes a moment to try and fathom the sight before him, before he manages to grasp the fact that the – thing – on Jongin’s bed is close to death, and he needs to take action.

Sehun quickly clambers on top of the boy as Jongin’s words spill from his lips, pouring out an explanation to try and help his friend understand. Sehun rests his head slightly above Kyungsoo’s face to stare across his chest, and speaks when Jongin finishes talking, seeing the boy’s chest rise ever so slightly, a weak and raspy breath escaping his lips.

“He’s alive.”

Jongin begins to sob again, resting his head on the bed, an incredible weight soaring off his shoulders. Kyungsoo should have been dead the moment the King left him on the seafloor, but he’s still clinging on to life, and that’s enough to assure Jongin he’ll survive.

Sehun jumps off the bed and sidesteps over Jongin to reach his wardrobe, pulling out a dry towel and an extra blanket. He lifts Kyungsoo’s torso and instructs Jongin to lay the blanket across the wet sheets, and sits the Mer prince on the floor, towelling off the moisture that remains on his cool skin. Jongin blurts the rest of his story as they make sure the boy is comfortable, and Sehun only speaks when he’s finished, assured that the talking has helped reduce his stress.

“You need to keep him warm,” Sehun explains – now is not the time for questioning. “And you should listen to, uh, Taemin. Keep Kyungsoo close to you. That’s the only thing keeping him alive.”

Sehun lifts up the former prince again and lays him onto the bed, wrapping him up in Jongin’s blankets. He pauses at Kyungsoo’s tail, unsure of what to do, and Jongin quickly takes over and covers it himself.

Sehun watches as his friend affectionately brushes the wet locks from Kyungsoo’s face, now calmer and emptied of tears, and realises Jongin missed out a vital point in his explanation of his relationship with the prince.

He’s in love with him.

Sehun bites his lip guiltily when Jongin turns to face him.

“I’m sorry, Jongin,” he apologises shakily. “This is all my fault.”

Jongin blinks in confusion, assuming he’s thinking of Kyungsoo, but realises he’s referring to the past few months they’ve spent out of contact, all because of their argument over Taemin’s existence. Now that Sehun is faced with the very real Mer prince lying right before him, he realises just how foolish he was to ever doubt something Jongin was so passionate about.

“It’s not,” Jongin says softly. “Anyone would have thought the same.”

“I should have trusted you.”

Jongin shakes his head and pulls Sehun in for a hug, squeezing him close. “I should have called you.”

Sehun smiles softly, sheepishly, and pats Jongin lightly on the back.

“No hard feelings?”

“No hard feelings,” Jongin agrees.

Sehun pulls away from Jongin and motions towards the sickly boy cocooned between the blankets. “It’s late. You should go to sleep.”

Jongin bites his lip seeing the clock. It’s past midnight, and only now he realises that Sehun looks undeniably exhausted. He’s about to protest and tell Sehun he’ll stay up and call a taxi for him, but his friend quickly moves away and backs out the door.

“I’ll stay here the night. My parents won’t mind.”

“Are you sure?”

“I’m sure.” Sehun assures. “Go to sleep. Yell for me if you need help.”

Sehun retires to the living room to set up the couch for sleep, and Jongin shuffles over to the bed, crouching beside it and cupping Kyungsoo’s cheeks in his palms.

He feels guilty for asking Sehun to come all this way when he could have easily checked for Kyungsoo’s heartbeat himself, but his fear overwhelmed his ability to approach the prince, fearful of what he would discover. Instead, he selfishly needed Sehun to do it for him. But he knows he couldn’t have taken care of Kyungsoo like this alone, not without Sehun’s support beside him.

Jongin is still afraid to check for signs of life, in case Kyungsoo slipped away without him noticing, but he places a hand over Kyungsoo’s mouth anyway, sighing in relief when he feels a soft, quivery breath of air ghost over his palm.

Tiredness finally overwhelms him and Jongin crawls under the blankets into bed, moving Kyungsoo closer to the wall, wrapping his arms around his fragile body. Finally, Jongin is assured that the prince is safe, nestled between the his body and the bedroom wall, wrapped up in the warm blankets protectively.

He can only hope his cold skin will warm by tomorrow morning.

* * *

“Sehun!” Jongin cries, “Wake up! Help!”

Sehun shoots up in alarm, eyes snapping open, and he pushes himself off the couch hurriedly – but his limbs are still asleep, and he tumbles to the floor clumsily.

“I’m coming!” he calls, scrambling to his feet and running to Jongin’s bedroom. He dreads a hysterical Jongin bent over a lifeless Mer, and hesitates momentarily before opening the door.

Jongin has stripped the bed of blankets and is kneeling beside it, his hands over Kyungsoo’s chest to feel his pulse. Kyungsoo’s skin has, thankfully, regained colour slightly – his tail, however, has lost. Instead of the brilliant indigo it used to be, the colour has seeped and blanched a dead-like grey.

“Is he breathing?”

“Only just. But he’s warm. I don’t understand.”

Sehun approaches and rests his fingers on Kyungsoo’s neck, detecting a light but very present pulse. He doesn’t see how the tail could be a sign of improvement – there’s no doubt that it looks deathly and ill.

“Did Taemin mention any of this?”

“No. He barely said anything,” Jongin moans. “He only told me to stay with Kyungsoo, and to keep him away from the Sea. I can’t leave and ask him what to do.”

Sehun confirms he can feel a heartbeat in Kyungsoo’s chest and assures that his breathing is steady, before straightening up and checking the time. It’s six in the morning – the sun hasn’t risen just yet, but there’s not much time left before dawn.

“I’ll go down and try to find him at sunrise,” Sehun offers. “He comes out of the water, right?”

Jongin stares up at his friend in surprise, gratitude lighting up his face.

“Would you really?”

“Only if you think he’ll reveal himself.”

Jongin nods eagerly, shoulders relaxing in relief. “Just sit by the rock shelves out of view. He might come up and sit there to wait for me.”

He turns his attention back to Kyungsoo and begins to tuck the blankets over him again, concerned about retaining his warmth, while Sehun leaves to brew coffee to alleviate the dark circles of exhaustion under Jongin’s eyes. He can tell his friend struggled to sleep, and he’ll need the caffeine – today is going to be a long day.

✏ [ a/n ] do you guys hate me less?? i think you hate me less now but i still love u

word count: 2721