Doomsday started off like any other day I'd managed to live through. It was still dark outside when my alarm went off, and I milked a few extra minutes in bed before I exposed myself to the cold, cold world.

In the back of my mind, I knew what day it was. It wasn't all that difficult to keep my focus off of it, though. That morning felt completely normal, and my only nerves were for my tests.

Why had I even bothered worrying about some science-fiction theory? What a waste of energy that had been.

Sure enough, I made it into the evening without any major incident. I'd had two finals, one in the morning and one in the afternoon, and I spent the time in between studying in the campus food court with my headphones in but music off. Both exams went well, I was willing to admit, and after exchanging an "It was nice knowing you" with a few of my now former classmates, I was ready to head home.

My family lived close enough to the university for me to commute, so I took the train home. Since it was winter it was already getting dark by the time I was ready to leave campus. That meant that everyone was irrationally nervous about letting me traveling alone. I was all but forced to take up an , and that was Chanyeol.

Chanyeol and I walked side-by-side on the sidewalk as we walked to the nearest station, our arms brushing against each other's on occasion. Chanyeol and I both got a little unnerved in crowds and liked to cling to someone else for security, but it was different when it was just the two of us. It was one of those situations when our gender difference reared its head, maybe; it was okay for Chanyeol to hold on to Baekhyun, but being too touchy with a girl would have been inappropriate and embarrassing. We still stuck close, though, and that was good enough for me.

Late December weather typically wasn't the type to take a stroll in, but the holiday season forced people to face the elements. They rushed around more and re-prioritized to make sure they were indoors and toasty as often and quickly as they could be, though, so the sidewalks weren't too crowded even if the streets and stores were. To tell the truth, my cheeks were burning and my ears felt like they were being gnawed off by the chill, but I played it casual. The train station was still a few blocks away, and Chanyeol, with his Dumbo ears and delicate skin, probably had it worse.

"So, we survived another day," Chanyeol pointed out as we moved. He turned to me, and I saw that his nose was bright pink. His eyes sparkled, probably watering from the cold,  and the fairness of his skin popped against the blackness of his bangs. He looked adorable, like an over-grown elf.

"Yup," I conceded, staring ahead with a wry smile. "I told you."

"All that hype for nothing." Chanyeol sighed. His breath hit the air as a white cloud. From the corner of my eye, I saw him glancing at me, his head cocked at an odd angle to try to gauge my expression. "How many people do you think did something crazy since it was supposed to be their last day on Earth?"

I let out a laugh and turned to face Chanyeol head-on. That seemed to make him happier for whatever reason, since his smile widened.

"I'm sure we'll be hearing all kinds of things tomorrow," I said, pulling my chin into my chest so I could jog forward three steps. Chanyeol's long-legged stride was a brisk walk for me. "I'm sure people got creative with that. I'm sure a lot of people will regret that."

"I don't know," Chanyeol said with a shrug. "It must have been good for some of them. It would have given them the courage to do something they were always too afraid to go through with."

"Like what?" I probed, peering at Chanyeol. "What would you have done?"

Chanyeol let out a low, raspy chuckle and avoided my eye. When he wasn't with Baekhyun, Chanyeol was considerably toned-down. He was still a Happy Virus for sure, never going anywhere without a smile, but his shy side came out when he was without the human Energizer Bunny, Baekhyun. I wasn't sure what about my question had made him so nervous, but his reaction was sweet.

"I don't know," the gentle giant said. We both knew he did know, though, so I just waited for him crack.

Chanyeol looked up at the sky in thought, and my eyes were drawn to the profile of his Adam's Apple as it bobbed. "The typical stuff like skydiving, I guess. And a few very honest conversations. Telling people off or admitting my true feelings." Chanyeol paused and dropped his head. "There must have been a lot of love confession going around today."

I hummed in agreement but left it at that. Chanyeol was probably right, but the idea wasn't exciting to me. I didn't really see the point in confessing your love to someone right before you both died. It didn't make a difference that way, did it? A confession was supposed to be romantic, not tragic.

Chanyeol nudged my arm with his elbow to regain my attention. His eyebrows were raised high and his straight, smile-less face seemed maniacal, which I had to smirk at..

"There'll be a ton of new couples walking around tomorrow," Chanyeol told me, nodding at least four times in succession.

"Or a ton of broken hearts," I countered. I didn't mean to be the party pooper, but my perspective might have been more realistic. How many people would have actually thought they were living their last day? And how many of them would have bothered blurting out feelings? It might have happened in the movies, but real life didn't often work that way. 

If Chanyeol was a mood-maker, I was a mood-wrecker. Chanyeol withdrew after my remark, making a mild tension creep between us. I'd thought he would have said something funny to keep the conversation going but he stiffened instead. I knew then that I'd made a wrong move.

A brooding Chanyeol was an alien life form that I didn't know how to handle. I wondered if he'd tried confessing to a girl and been rejected. My honesty might have been a blunt blow. I wanted to come up with a more charming comment to bring our interaction back to life, but the right words evaded me.

I spent too much time deliberating and had no choice but to accept my folly.

I pulled in a deep breath, letting my chest expand to its fullest. The cold air seared my insides and brought tears to my eyes, but I took that as a sort of reprimand from the cosmos. Beside me, Chanyeol stuffed his hands deep into his coat pockets, hunching his shoulders and hanging his head. He only picked his chin up to watch where he was going and gaze up at the emerging stars from time to time, when the coast ahead was clear. Our shoes slapping the sidewalk became the only exchanged audio.

We kept going like that for some time. Soon, the train station was in sight half a block away.

That was when Chanyeol started slowing down.

It was too soon for him to be pulling back to say goodbye, so I hesitated and looked over my shoulder, frowning. Chanyeol had eased to a complete stop a few steps behind me, his eyes sky cast and forehead creased. Rather than ask what was wrong, I looked where he was looking.

There was nothing out of the ordinary. There wasn't even a plane or anything flying over head. Just the moon and stars and the last of the light from the sun.

"What?" I questioned since I couldn't figure it out for myself, turning back to Chanyeol. His expression was pinched in concentration, a cognitive pout on his lips, and his eyes darted to me for only a second before returning to the sky.

"Nothing." The word tumbled out of his mouth, obviously meaningless since his expression was still troubled and his attention still elsewhere. "It's just, I mean..."

Chanyeol shifted his weight, letting the length of his body rock as if it would give him another perspective or snap him out of it. When it didn't work, his eyes narrowed even more and his tone took on a slight tilt of panic. "Are you seeing what I'm seeing?"

I zeroed in on Chanyeol's eyes. They weren't locked on one single object or area but flickering back and forth from one side of the sky to another.

The sky seemed the same to me. I didn't understand. Deep blues and purples painted the backdrop, fading into a white wash near the horizon. Tiny pin-pricks of stars were just starting to wake up, and the moon was bright and silver off to the left. On the right, the moon was hanging high in the sky and larger than I'd seen it in a long time. It was the pale orange-y shade of harvest and beautiful.

Moons.

My body grasped the situation before my mind did. My eyes danced like Chanyeol's between the silver moon to the left and the harvest moon on the right.

Two moons.

Two moons?

What?

I fumbled to make sense of it. There had to be an explanation. Only one of the moons could be real. But then what was the other one? Was it natural or some kind of Doomsday prank? Would NASA pull a stunt like that for s and giggles?

I was numbly aware of stepping back, retreating until I could feel Chanyeol behind me. Our bodies seemed equally electrically charged, and I knew he bristled once I got close, squaring his shoulders and standing even taller over me.

"What is that?" I breathed. But I wasn't really waiting on an answer. I didn't expect one.

Certain aspects of each moon began to pop out. The one on the left was the most normal looking, but had the moon always been that silver? Shined so intensely?

The moon on the right actually didn't look so much like a moon in comparison. I couldn't pick out too many craters or canyons. It's surface was smoother, like a planet's. Was it Nibiru? That Planet X that was supposed to be on a collision course with Earth? But scientists had debunked that ages ago. Had they lied?

Chanyeol swallowed, or maybe gulped. His tone was both high and hoarse when he spoke. "Dunno."

The closer I looked, the more confused I became. There was a sort of reddish halo on Planet X. The other moon had such a luminous shine that it was almost white. Blindingly white.

And it was moving.

I wasn't sure if I was more confused or scared. There wasn't a whole lot to be afraid of, really; there were no earthquakes or comets like Doomsday stories told, but I almost wished there would have been. Adrenaline usually kicked in with chaos, so at least I could have screamed or run or just done something. Was I even in danger? I didn't know what was happening so I didn't know how to react.

But moons didn't just jet across the sky. That wasn't normal.

That was scary.

My instincts kicked in. My feet slid back until I was almost on top of Chanyeol. He inched forward into me in return and his hands came up to hold my shoulders. I could feel the tremor in his fingers but I appreciated the contact. At least I wasn't the only one. At least I wasn't alone.

Chanyeol and I didn't speak. The world seemed to go quiet as we watched one moon streak between the stars. As it came closer to the other moon, its brightness was drowned out. It darkened to a grey, and then black. It slid over its twin, eclipsing it perfectly. The two moons fit one on top of the other like they were meant to be, making a hazy, fiery ring above us.

The entire planet seemed to black out after that. I didn't know what happened to the streetlights or the stars, but I knew they were gone. I could only see the moons. I could only feel Chanyeol squeezing me. I didn't feel particularly alarmed anymore. I felt numb.

Then the sky opened up. Like the rising of a white sun, a horizontal line appeared, first as a single, thin crack before it broadened. It lit everything up in a flash, turning the black out into a white out.

I couldn't think. I couldn't react. I just let it all happen. I let it overwhelm me.

My feet weren't on the ground. I wasn't aware of gravity keeping me up. I was floating, for all I knew.

Chanyeol's hands weren't on me anymore, but that was okay. He was okay. I was okay.

Were my eyes closed or did I only see white and nothing else?

They must have been closed, because at some point everything came back. Everything fell back into place. I could feel again, I could think again, I could see again.

And from then on, nothing was okay.