Miss Ariel, it seems as though Prince Eric will kill himself. 

The mermaid stares into the distance, her brown eyes staring at the night sky, lightning flashes and the rain pounds against the window, enticing her, the thunder crashes, but she stands there, waiting for the clap of thunder to echo once again.

And there's a flash, another boom making the girl's ears ring with excitement. She slips off her socks, and as though there's humans who could hear the footsteps of an innocuous soul, she tip toes out of her apartment, afraid of the sweaty and coarse palms that slither out of the cervices of the floor boards, the ones that take her feet and drag her to the sea witch's cove, wondering, waiting for the fiery haired girl to disappear in the sea into nothingness. Her bare soles feel the vibrations, and they burn, almost aching at the thoughts of movement.

woong 1:21AM: are you quivering at the sight of lightning?

The screen flashes, her eyes widen and she ignores the hands of the merfolk who dwell under the hardwood floors, who want her soul, and the pain she feels subsides as she approaches the wet pavement of the outside world. The burn she feels upon her soles transforms to the scarlet color of blood. Her copper hair glimmers in the moonlight, but the shine would lose against the rain, matting her hair that others envy. And her lips would purse together, becoming pale and pink. But her feet would bleed as she spins around, gliding on the pavement as she continues to dance. Her feet continues to bleed as her limbs amble into the darker shadows of the town.

And perhaps it's the way she dances in the thunder storm that he has a penchant for, or the way her light hair cascades past her shoulders, sticking to her face as she carelessly spins, not afraid of any burden that comes to her.

sora 1:27AM: i am not, but are you, coward? 

The tips of his lips curve a little, his inky eyes find the courageous soul who stares at him as he sits on top of his family's herb shop. His jet black hair is continuing to get wet as the rain pours, and he gestures the girl to join her prince on the roof, but she only tilts her head carefully to the side, her eyes widening in curiosity, wondering how humans have this ability to fly or sit comfortably on roofs. 

"Hurry!" The girl yelps as the thunder echoes, almost becoming a hypocrite with her own words, but the mortal jolts in surprise not realizing that the thunder would come echoing back. Masquerading his slight cowardice, he languidly jumps off the roof, landing on his knees and hands. His knees have scrapes and the palms of his hands contain gravel, blood and cuts. His inky eyes only stare blankly at the wound he acquires, and before he can inquire why she lacks shoes, the petite red head intertwines his fingers, (he grimaces at the contact), his hands throbs as the taciturn male follows her into the aroma of herbs. 

"You sure do know how to hurt yourself," Sora drones as her fingers graze the multiple jars of the natural medicine, her hand stopping at a jar of a lilac colored plant hiding, moving it out of the way for the first aid kit, she hides for purposes such as these. Woong stares as she brushes away a lock of her hair, or the way she gently presses the alcohol to his palms, he grimaces as the pain strengthens the longer the alcohol pad is on his palm. The scent that is strong in the air disappears as the green tea wafts into the atmosphere, he can smell the scent of ginseng, an additive that Sora enjoys with her tea. 

"Pain is ephemeral," he deadpans. It's Woong, who will never say more than needed, his voice box is surrounded by cob webs and his sound waves almost misses her ears. It stays latent, always hidden to keep hunters away from the lovely sound his voice makes. His hair begins to hide his soulless black eyes that deceive Park Sora. 

"You're bleeding," he mumbles, his pale finger pointing at her feet. 

She raises a leg to inspect the damage, not flinching when Woong limps over to the side, dusting off the dirt and germs, she always thinks of the Prince of a germaphobe, allergic to anything that involves contact with other mortals or humans that are below him. It's almost as though he's condescending and pompous. But then she drinks her green tea, contemplates that the dazzling man in front of her is nothing but kind and sweet and the theory that Woong is a stereotype slips her mind. He catches the limp curves of her lips and returns it with a curt nod. It's his idea of thanking someone, she discovers. 

But then he sits next to her, listening to the haunting music of rain, staring at their empty mugs of green tea or in idleness not saying a word, only recollecting thoughts, drowning their selves in poison, secret communication and disarray of future actions that lead to their downfall. 

His eyes travel to the bright irises that only glaze over when his dark eyes meet hers. Woong tucks a lock of her hair behind her ears. The blank eyes look back at his and there’s a slight curve of his lips. A curve that only Sora understands in their dangerous language of grim fairy tales, of daunting shimmers and tight ropes that they walk upon. 

"I don't believe you'll become sea foam." 

His voice is rasp and still needs tuning, but it's deep and alluring to her ears. The words he spins upon his spindle seem to be resonating with her simple process of thinking. And she brings the lukewarm liquid to her lips, her eyes catches his eyes once more, pretending that his words aren't causing the amount of serotonin to decrease or that it's not making her heart race because he’s feeding her hope that she doesn’t believe.

"You think so?" she asks curiously, a small smile appearing on her lips and the raven-haired boy analyzes that those arches don't reach her eyes and continues to find that her eyes aren't crinkling at the thought of it. She's scared, he believes, the way she puts the mug down on the counter or how her fingers weave through her hair, or when she looks at him again, flashing spinelessness for a moment.

"Lee Chi Hoon kissed you," he states aloofly, there's a shrug from her shoulders, not noticing the slight anger in his voice. 

"I still bleed," Sora comments, pointing to the trail of blood on the hardwood floors of his mother's shop.

"Besides, you two liked each other." And her eyes glaze all over again, void of any emotion other than melancholy and loneliness. 

"When do you die?" he asks carelessly, changing topics when she brings up a new theory that he's homoual. It's unlike Woong to blurt the last of his thoughts or even adding drops of poison to her diaphanous skin, aiming for the veins that run across her arms, it's almost though as he wants her to curl and cringe, feel his loneliness with his own words. 

"Your time is almost up, you're lacking in the departments of euphoria and ecstasy, who could ever love a girl who bleeds and is always causing trouble for boys who don't like her? The only mortal you've ever enticed is that idiotic Nam Woong who is in love with another mortal, you idiot."

But her voice sounds foreign to his ears, it's a cacophony of malice and bitterness. She derides herself as though she's possessed, her eyes widen a little as she realizes what's being uttered into the room, words that swirl in the room and he it up as though it's nothing. 

"That doesn't me-"

"I have a note. I have until sunrise." 

Sora's eyes search for his empty eyes, any emotion to tell her that it would be alright, everything will be okay, but he only glances at her with those eyes, nothing in them and no words to reassure her. If anything, he would only nullify her hopes and numb her happiness. But there's a glint in those dark eyes, an evil being must possess him because he takes hold of her wrist, forces her to change into a cleaner shirt (his shirts are too large for her, but they will have to do), forces her into shoes that his mother makes for her, and runs. An itinerant and defiant act that Sora can't help but laugh with a tiny bit of happiness. He laces their fingers together the moment they disappear from the shop. He's capturing the pretty princess and taking her away to his lair. He changes her opinions about princes being heros. 

But his lair is a garden, of pink and white roses, playing with the monotonous villain when he only wants her here, locked up and in his grasps. He will not let anyone else do so.

"We met here," she dully whispers, breaking her bones before someone can break them for her and continues to numb herself from the pain later. He only watches, he only stares as her willowy figure grazes the roses that are starting to die, rotting, petals that fall to the ground, and then there's a piercing that creates crimson metallic liquid. He takes out a band aid out of his pockets, and with a soft smile wraps her finger with the Mickey Mouse bandage. 

"You pricked your finger here as well," Woong muses, the girl stares at him, not understanding how evil is supposed to be kind. His eyes stare at the skies, there's no stars in the night sky, and instead the darkness swallows them all with its devilish grin and temptations. The melancholy embodies him, but as she blinks, it's gone, in returns the wanderlust she's not quite used to but she knows of, and it's not an artificial look, it almost resembles happiness in her eyes, but no amount of this forbidden ambrosia can relieve her of her sadness. And their fingers become lock and key again, his fits perfectly with hers, it's a technique to keep one of them sane, almost a code word that reassures the other that they are there. But he can't tell her why he has a sudden surge of courage to link their hands together, he doesn't understand if it's because his hands are cold or if it is because he wants to hold her hand. 

Their lips are sealed and their steps become in sync as they amble across the garden like star-crossed lovers or if they're significant others on what mortals would call a date, touching the soft petals of the roses or admiring the blooms of the cherry blossoms. Thunder strikes and Woong tenses because it stopped raining an hour ago, but the thunder persists. 

"Do you want to go inside?" Sora asks. He nods his head in reply and her eyes wander, her smile is a parabola that isn't centered at the origin, but it's not a parent function as well, a slope that widens and it's not all that big, but he knows it's a smile nonetheless. They become untangled, but he follows her in the dark, watches her figure as she twirls and spins to the next destination, the destination that he can't figure out because Sora is unconventional and unorthodox. She spins in his light blue button down shirt, her tights barely warming her in situations like these and in that instance there's ecstasy in her veins that have found its way to her brain and create nerves that the poison used to kill. But then she stops dancing, her figure dulls and her smile cracks, any ambrosia he finds in her disappears. 

"Hurry!" Sora squeals, her voice sounds like the warmth of too sweet candy and he needs to neutralize this sweetness with his bitterness. 

"I will take my time, Miss Park," he states gravely. As though he breaks her soul and she remembers that he is the bearer of the alcohol, the salty-infused concoction that keeps her alive for a little more than usual. She waits inside, waits for the boy who floats, the one with diaphanous skin that she injects sweet nothings into and he's a ghost, she thinks as he hovers by her side. The warehouse is dark and is murky, the musty smell overwhelms him, it’s not a place Woong would like to spend his night, but it would have to do. But then he notices the skyline, the paint canvases on the sides, empty buckets of paint that lay there, and he grins. His hands land upon her shoulder, tossing the bright hair off the other side, wanting her to stay longer. A selfish wish when he knows that she doesn't feel the need to breathe anymore or to pretend that she's still that naive and bubbly girl he met years ago. But he lays his head upon her shoulder, blowing on her neck like he does when he doesn't have a slight clue what to say. 

They linger in the darkness. The scent of paint and pastels causing the boy to get dizzy for a moment. In the corner of his eyes, he sees the gleam of contentment, as though standing in front of the skyline windows and being surrounded by the timid evil is beautiful in her eyes. 

"Let's stay like this," she whispers, causing the scared evil to walk upon her ribs, leaving their tracks upon her broken bones, it's numb and quiet when she says that, he doesn't dare say anything more. "Just like this," she mumbles, choking on the last few words. A tragedy, he'll be there to watch her dissipate and turn into foam. He's so close, so close to the sea, figuring out the puzzle pieces that complete her, to solving the equation that finds what will equal to her happiness.

And then he lifts his head off her shoulders, stares at the broken girl besides him, the one who would share the illegal moonshine with him in tiny tea cups or tell him that he's the perfect prince for her because he's nothing like her and she's nothing like him. The one who he thinks he knows because she's conventional, but then things change and she changes like the seasons. As though she's autumn and he's stuck in the storm, wanting the seasons to change, but that would mean letting the fall leaves suffer alone.

"No," he says at the highest decibel he can reach and she turns to him. His sudden outburst confuses himself, he's the coward person standing beside her. It almost makes his ears ring because it's too loud for his liking, but he says it again. "No." And he's logical, he doesn't really love her because it's an emotion that he would like to stray away, but he doesn't understand why he is closing in the space (because that's illogical), or why he's trying to find stardust and he's more than sure that he's not attracted to this conventional beauty because linear graphs are continuous and there's no discontinuity in a linear graph, it's not as though it approaches infinity or negative infinity at any given point and the limit does indeed exist, but his lips presses against hers, his hands that he swears he has control over, seem to wrap around her waist and Woong told her long ago that he'd let her marry him so she can collect the inheritance and it's not because there's any other emotion involved with it. 

Sora stares at him, only stares at him, and in the reflection of her eyes, he can see his eyes staring right back at her with an emotion that is foreign to his body. "Don't do that again," she warns, it's a mundane response to his kiss that doesn't make sense to himself either. And she reaches for his fingers, the same fingers that followed a trail to the stars etched on her back and his decision doesn't compute with his traits. His brain hurts. But they go up the stairs, fingers still intertwined, and the boundaries become blurred as she lays her head upon his legs and they stare at the sky, waiting for the sun to rise so she can finally disappear from this wretched world. He runs his fingers through her auburn hair once again and she stares longingly at him. 

Woong is close to solving the equation, but she reaches for his cheeks, grazing her fingers upon his translucent skin, praying he isn't a ghost, he looks down upon her, finding the lost magic back in her coffee colored eyes, and he smiles, the answer to his equation is the contentment with one person. He brushes away any stray locks before kissing her forehead. 

It's almost a blur what happens next, the sun rises, her fingers become intertwined with his and she stays there, in his grasps, fingers laced, her smile becomes softer, the sun shines in the autumn storm of thunder and lightning, he gazes at her, and she only stares at him. 

"It’s a long way down, but it’s okay if you’re beside me," she whispers and she notices the stardust in his eyes, his pale skin staring at her with a smile. A parabola shaped smile is evident on his lips, his inky black eyes stares at her with an emotion foreign to her being, he reeks of green tea and morning rain, and his skin is rough like always. But there’s stardust in his eyes, just stardust.  

in my hands:

• "It's a long way down, but it's okay if you're beside me." (last thing that sora says in the one-shot.)
• dancing in the rain. (once she gets out of the apartment, woong stares at her way of walking, it's not even walking anymore, it's dancing.)
• threatening note. (first line and the sea witch's last warning.)
• the antagonist wins. (woong is technically the antagonist, with sora believing he's a stereotypical villain and at the same, he's just someone who opposes sora, sora who wants nothing but to die while woong wants her to live.)
• "she reminded me of the sea; the way she came dancing towards you, wild and beautiful, and when just when you were almost close enough to touch she'd rush away again." (sora in the beginning, subtle hints and sometimes woong's observations.)