...in which they cherish every breath they take

special treat - my entry for Infinite Secret Santa 2014

given prompt: Either of the two finds the other out in the cold. Rescue story.

Myungsoo/Sungjong

3198 words

dedicated to DGNA_Forever

Questions.

“Why won't you stay with your family when you know what's coming?”

Wrong questions at the worst of times; questions he shouldn't know answers for.

“Why are you walking away from everything?”

They were still ringing in his head as he ran.

The wind was biting, the snowflakes blocking his view. There was nowhere to go, there was no one around; yet still, he ran. Knowing where he wanted to be, needed to be, he tried to guess the way.  He needed to see if everything he was told was true.

“Because I don't have a family. Not anymore.”

He remembered every word he had told them.

“Because there's nothing strong enough to hold me in place.”

Every word.

He knew what was coming, everyone did. Death was coming. It had never been so close. It was just a matter of time, he knew. And so he ran through white and grey and he couldn't see anything that would lead him through. Sometimes he found himself wondering if he already wasn't on the other side and if so, was he supposed to hurt so much? Was he supposed to feel the cold? The stinging pain?

They had told him that there was likely a zero possibility that Sungjong was still alive. He had lashed out on them, naturally. He hated them all for trying to take all he treasured away from him; he hated his family just as they hated him. They drugged him, strapped him down on his bed, kept him a prisoner.

Until his younger brother came a let him go.

“Go, hyung.” he had said. “Find him and be there with him when it all ends.”

Myungsoo still felt the guilt for leaving his brother there with the rest of their family. His brother was only sixteen but already wiser than any grown-up he had ever met.

Humans were cruel creatures. During the second half of the twenty-first century, they had tried to outsmart the still worsening global warming countless of times. They were too greedy and too inconsiderate and it had led to millions of dead every day. If he were to be honest, he would say it was a curse to be born as a member of a race that only knew how to devastate and slaughter.

The temperature was dropping every second and time was ticking. He needed to see Sungjong before it would all end, as his brother accurately put it. Snow was up near his knees, the wind was even harsher than it had been five minutes before and all he could see was white still.

“Find him.”

By guess, the place he was at was the place where he and Sungjong met for the first time, as children. Faintly, he could tell the metal climbing frames apart from the white. It was winter back then.

“You will fall down!” he yelled at the skinny kid hanging head down from the highest pole.

The other boy just stuck out his tongue at him, “What would you do if I fell down?” he asked, while swinging back and forth.

“Nothing. Laugh at you for being stupid.” Myungsoo crossed his arms and turned his head away.

“Hey! How can you say that to your friend!” the boy exclaimed, hopping down from the pole.

“We're not friends.” Myungsoo commented after a while.

“Yes, we are. From now on.”

Friends. Of course they were friends, they were brothers who eventually became lovers. Myungsoo had learned with time that Sungjong did not come from wealthy environment like he did; the more time he spent with Sungjong, the more he thought of his own life as of a curse. He wanted to enjoy every meal and treat it like his last, he wanted to cherish every little dose of oxygen that kept him alive every time he took a breath.

But every time he tried to focus on every breath, he soon got distracted, because he simply knew his last breath was not coming just yet. Sungjong didn't seem like that, though. Certainly, being rich did not bear every advantage that existed. Sungjong had always been prepared to die, regardless of the situation; he was telling his mother that he loved her every day, he was telling his brother to be good to her all the time.

Myungsoo's hair on the back of his neck prickled every time the word 'death' was said.

Fear was not a good word in his house and nor was homouality. When his parents and other close relatives found out about the two of them, they threw a tantrum. Back then, Myungsoo was forbidden from leaving his room until he was told otherwise. Nonetheless, with the help of his brother, he was able to get out within a few hours. He found Sungjong and stayed at his place for a few days.

If he were to say the truth, as he fought his way through the heaps of snow, he'd say that those few days had been the best in his life as it was.

“Go, hyung.”

Out in the cold, he suddenly remembered to concentrate on his every breath, because he wasn't so sure that his last breath was not coming just yet. With a very obscure idea of where he was going, he carefully chose where he would step next and calculated how much time it would take him to get to Sungjong's place. Who knew how many corpses buried under the snow he had stepped on since he had left the house, who knew how many living were still there, ready to grab his feet once he would get to them. Who knew how many died just within the previous hour.

Who knew if Myungsoo himself was going to make it. He was running late. Freezing to the bone, wet all over, he was soon stopping to feel his hands and face. It was June.

Narrowing his eyes, he could make out the outlines of buildings about one hundred metres ahead of him. The motivation was driving him forward; he needed to see Sungjong one last time before he died and he needed to say sorry.

When they were still children and unable to see the world's end coming, Myungsoo often caught himself imagining his future. What it would be like, what would his wife look like, if they would have many kids and he had once asked Sungjong if he imagined his future like that as well.

“No, hyung.” he had answered, “I can't afford that luxury. To think I'd ever have kids, I mean. Mum told me I wasn't even supposed to be born, but she just couldn't get rid of me.”

Back then, Myungsoo barely knew what the word 'abortion' meant and was in awe how well Sungjong talked even when they both were not even teenagers. With time, Myungsoo understood why Sungjong 'couldn't have afforded that luxury'. In an environment where you have to count every coin, the thought of having children must have been a complete utopia.

And there they were. Bound to die any moment, when every of their breaths could be their last. Myungsoo hated uncertainty; he could not stand the fact that he simply did not know whether or not his effort to find Sungjong was to come in vain.

“Go, hyung. Find him.”

There was one thing he was sure about, though; whether or not Sungjong was alive while he was there searching for him, Myungsoo was sure he would die beside him. Only then had he realised that he would never see any of the people he knew ever again, that he would probably never laugh with the rest of his friends again. It hurt a little but no more than the thought of finding Sungjong already gone. That hurt more than leaving his brother in the lion's den,