The ocean howls and thrashes ferociously in this night, mountainous tidal waves merciless as they toss around a ship that bobs between angry, dark waters; drowning under the heights of Poseidon's wrath. You carry a daughter of the sea with you, the storm cries, below the boards of your Captain’s chambers, stowed away with barrels of rotten condiments and emptying cylinders. She is waiting for daybreak. But we want her now. In the light of the full moon.

The Exodus keeps its silence through the onslaught of the sea's strength, stays as cold and steely to the assault as the metal it were carved from. Its presence is little more than a toy, falling under the mercy of childlike hands that fiddle and fool with its exterior, played with by the malevolent current. However its shape remains sturdy and firm, deck unchangingly upright and bars of a monster's cell unshaken: strong around its captive.

A sliver of silver light trickles into the cell from the window perched high on the wall. It illuminates the wretched darkness, lightens the lonely cell. It unveils her unholy form from beneath the shrouded shadows. Claws for fingernails. Triangles for teeth. Blood for tears. Sweetly crooned melodies for cries of mercy. She lies sprawled on the floor, panting, drenched in the sweat of her own anguish: a child trapped in an iron cage.

She is so, so tired. So scared. Forced to listen to every menacing threat and sinister snarl that pours out of her own mind like blood gushing from a hole in a dying heart. Forced to fight against the urge to just give in. The monster inside has such a tight grip around her on the nights of the full moon, such control that it might as well compel her to dig spiked nails into her own slender neck, claw out an opening chisled into young flesh for it to escape her body; give her a chance to finally be at peace.

She's so scared. What's to become of her? She's so alone.

But she is also so, so hungry. She can't deny this. The monster within her persists, its malignant presence causing a quaking in her emptied stomach, stabs of agony between her ribs until she can't even in a quivering breath without searing pains of starvation spreading throughout her entire body. Her canines ache to puncture skin, to drink in long satisfying gulps of warm red vital liquid. Her parched tongue curls around her torn lips, aching to taste soothed souls against its starving buds. She longs for the flavour of humans marinated to the bone in her sound, in their fear. Hates those who have kept her here. Will kill them all. She will. She won’t stop until they’re limp in her grasp. Won’t yield to their pleas for mercy. She will. She will-

Mercy, she pleas for herself, tears blurring her vision. That is all she wants. Mercy. Her teeth bite down on her own blistered lips to get even a little taste of the sweetness that she so longs for.

It’s anything but sweet. Entirely metallic and stomach churning.

There's a rustle in the distance. A clamouring of soles against marble floors. It has her heart rate picking up in anticipation, exhilaration, dread.

Footsteps are approaching. Someone's coming. Someone who’s finally heard her prayers. Someone who’s come to help. Finally.

//

How does one romanticise a storm?

It’s simple, really. You fall in love with one.

You let yourself be struck with platinum lightning that sings through your veins, scorches your flesh and lights your insides on fire. You allow it to infect you - to devour you - until the rumbling of blood against your ears mimic the thunder that plagues your dreams, until brilliant sparks fade into dark looming clouds that numb your judgement, veil it until you can think of nothing but cold wind. You let the destruction around you become a relentless constant, a twisted solace of sorts. You build yourself a home in the eye of the hurricane, in those eyes that promise never to look away from yours so long as you stay there within them.

You become a part of it. A part of a chaos. A part of the storm.

You become one yourself, so lost in your surroundings that you don’t know where you start and where the demons lurking in the swirling debris end.

And then you succumb.

Chanyeol watches his storm - his lover, his captain, his hurricane wrapped up in skin - from beneath fluttering eyelashes, under a dim light provided by a candle that flickers on the bedside table of their shared chambers. His eyes follow where the light caresses his little lover’s body, gaze drifting along the line between light and shadow, drawn in by the other male’s languid movements. Every gentle open and shut of hooded eyelids, every subtle shift of limbs against a soft mattress replaces the images of raging winds with pictures of gentle oceans breezes, visions of quiet whispers strewn across tousled silken sheets that disappear into the night, only for them to hear. He drinks him in: his body, his face, his scent, his everything. Like this time seems to stretch a little wider, tender murmurs allowed to bleed out across prolonged seconds, drowning out the chaos that surrounds them like a blinding fog. Chanyeol watches the way syllables linger on the tip of Baekhyun's tongue, waiting to be articulated and spilled across his skin like ink, left to drip along his angles and curves and edges before they seep into the pores of his flesh as slowly as they’d been released from the confines of perfect, pink lips.

It's been around a month since they've landed on Earth - or so he assumes. He doesn’t really know. He doesn’t measure time in seconds and hours anymore but instead with sunsets, memories and moments spent with Baekhyun. And such moments have been plentiful.

When they were out in space, Chanyeol had begun to think that he'd just about seen all of Baekhyun and all the multiple dimensions he has to him. And had they stayed there in the abyss, that might as well have been the case. But it's not. Because here, at sea, back home where the raven haired male belongs - where Chanyeol had once thought he belonged too - the redhead has seen nothing but new, wondrous sides to Baekhyun: fresh, beautiful visions of him to cherish. To keep. Because here, he is not the pirate Captain Byun feared throughout the cosmos, here he is just Byun Baekhyun; he is attainable - no longer a lost, wandering spirit but an existence that's much more tangible and real.

Ordinary sailor Baekhyun, Chanyeol has come to realise, looks beautiful against a backdrop of blue: devoid of angry metal chains that cohere to his body and bear his inner mental state to the world; in a setting where there is only endless azure painted across all sides of the horizon.

Baekhyun glows against the sunset in ways Chanyeol could've never even imagined. When the sun fades and dyes the sky in beautiful streaks of orange like a final bid farewell, as if leaving behind a sign that it was in fact here, I was here, is what the blotches of tender pinks and purples that diffuse across the rippling water's surface convey. I am here, is what Baekhyun's eyes that light up like stars painted onto a landscape of blue, blue, blue, cry out. I am home.

I am home, Chanyeol thinks every time he becomes entranced by the sight of the raven haired male being drenched in a halo of light. He is left breathless every time he catches his counterpart smiling a little wider, a little softer, as the gentle sea breeze runs its fingers through the tendrils of his mussed hair. He wonders how much more brilliantly Baekhyun would shine under a night sky, sharp features blurred under the light of a full moon, whether he would rival the ethereality of the glowing globe or drown it out all together.

He decides that is something they can never know. Not for now, at least. The full moon is off limits. The sight is not so much a symbol of beauty as it is a symbol of danger to the men aboard the Exodus. It symbolises her awakening. No one is to step out their rooms until sunlight.

They can't hear her anymore. Not with the wax in their ears - a new found secret picked up between the shadows of whispers left by wandering merchants and sailors on passing islands. It doesn't mean they can't feel her, though: how her sickly sweet voice shakes the night, bleeds down the walls, causes the floorboards beneath them to rumble in smothered anger. They can still feel how the entire ship trembles when saccharine singing turns to shrill screams, curses and crimson threats dripping from a young mouth lined with sharp teeth as sound itself electrocutes the air. It floats atop the tortured roaring of the sea, settles over the sailors whose lips fumble with the mispronounced names of long forgotten deities.

But at least for now - for the two captains - the pull of her is little compared to the pull of each other.

The raven haired male lies still in his lover's arms, nose pressed against his shoulder. Chanyeol is almost unnerved by the way his counterpart's black pupils slowly shift and drift along the lines of his features intently, as if trying to relearn the soft curves and harsh angles of his face, abosorb them into the endless abyss of his eyes. Not that he needs to. He already knows Chanyeol's face like the back of his hand.

Chanyeol feels a tug at his throat, an itch at his tongue, understanding. If it’s a distraction Baekhyun needs, then it’s a distraction he’ll give him.

"Tell me your favourite colour," the red haired captain whispers above the deafening chaos, settles his raspy baritone between the gaps of hushed restlessness that nestles itself under the surface of Baekhyun's skin. In the manner of an overgrown child, he entangles their legs beneath silken sheets and waits for an answer, eyes patient yet probing. His deep baritone carries a teasing lilt that pairs with his lopsided, sleepy grin in the most juvenile of ways - an attempt at keeping the atmosphere light though it weighs down on them like lead. Covers them like a comforter named wrong.

Black, Baekhyun wants to reply, hectic thoughts of monsters and claws and canines dimming down as his attention shifts to focus on thin eyelashes, matted hair and a curious gaze. Black for the colour of his lover’s eyes. Black for the colour of boundless space. Black for it was all Baekhyun had ever known before meeting Chanyeol.

Chanyeol already knows the answer. He's asked before. He asks every time they're holed up in their chambers together, the full moon hidden behind heavy velvet curtains. He'll continue to ask so long as Baekhyun needs him to.

The raven haired Captain holds his tongue this time, keeps the rehearsed answer to himself as he sticks to soundlessly scanning his lover's face with unnerving intensity. He's thinking. Scheming how best to go about getting what he wants. And Chanyeol knows he wants something, knows him well enough without all the questions to dread the glint in his eyes. When the smaller male shifts to rest on his side, angling his body towards him, Chanyeol gives up waiting for an answer. Moves to accommodate the new fit of their bodies.

He probably enjoys this, Chanyeol reckons, the way he commands his attention so effortlessly, has him on edge, holding his breath even if all he's doing is suspending the silence for a beat too long. Halting time.

When Baekhyun next speaks, the short tension melts away like nothing, his soothing tenor washing over the taller male like a thick layer of honey. A voice so sweet it could rival Seulgi’s.

“I’d much rather you answer me some questions about you, this time.”

Chanyeol misses a beat out of surprise before he's letting out a chuckle that's too musical and carefree for Baekhyun's liking. Too dismissive. A reaction to a passing joke. “I’m afraid I’m a rather boring bedtime story, love,” he supplies, reaching up to brush his lover’s ebony locks out of his eyes. To Chanyeol it’s not the excuse the other male thinks it to be. He’s not story book worthy, not interesting enough to even play a supporting role. It’s never been about him - whatever it may be. Life, perhaps. It’s always been about his father, the Great Captain Park, about the long flashy list of past lovers' names written in cursive golden ink. It’s always been about the people, the animals, the worlds he’s tried to fix before; it’s never truly been about him.

Baekhyun furrows his brows, not quite understanding. Chanyeol laces their fingers together, brings them against his lips to press a soft kiss against softer knuckles - a perfect fit: a hopeful distraction.

It falls short.

“Then you won’t have any objections to sharing,” Baekhyun persists, voice quiet yet urging as he brushes a thumb against swollen lips. Something flickers within Chanyeol’s own eyes - too fast for Baekhyun to register, too foreign for him to understand. He wonders why it feels like with every step closer he dares to take, it’s almost as if Chanyeol were taking two shaky ones backwards. He’s always teetering on the edge of running and staying, always distant. It was never like this before. Before -

"Do you not want to tell me?" he asks, speaking before he's thrown back in the same loop he's been stuck in for the past few full moons. His voice shakes too much for his own liking but the sound of it is much easier on his ears than the haunting whisper that plays in the back of his mind. A shadow waiting to surface. A menacing hiss of "this is your fault." A single line on repeat. Yet still nothing but the truth.

Chanyeol must hear it too - the desperateness in his voice - if the way his eyes soften ever so slightly is anything to go by. They drop to take in the way Baekhyun chews his lower lip with unease, darkening a shade.

A moment of tense silence drags on between the two men before Chanyeol is speaking up again, slowly exhaling a held back sigh. “What is it that you want to know?” Baekhyun is jolted out of his tremulous thoughts and inhales, taking a part of Chanyeol’s soul with him.

“Everything,” Baekhyun breathes out, a few beats too rushed, tongue fumbling over the syllables that roll past his lips in a hurry, all too fast for the fear that Chanyeol would retreat if given any more time to think about it. He clears his throat when he catches himself. “Everything,” he repeats, firmer, sturdier, more demanding: determined to redeem himself no matter how foolish the notion may be.

“You’re going to have to narrow it down more than that, love,” Chanyeol chuckles, brushing calloused fingers through inky black locks. Baekhyun barely registers the way his body automatically relaxes in reaction to his touch, too busy thinking for a question to ask. For a place to start.

When he finally thinks of a question, he turns his entire body to face the red head, eyes rounding in earnest curiosity. “I know about your father,” a sliver of silence escapes both males, a healing wound is scraped but not reopened. "Tell me about your mother instead this time.” This topic is safe. Approachable.

“I never knew her.” Or so he thought. Chanyeol’s answer is short and concise, released in the same beat as a sigh. It makes Baekhyun wince and deflate, chastising himself for bringing up such a subject. He didn’t know. He doesn’t know much about Chanyeol. Not the details, at least.

“Oh.” Chanyeol's throat bobs as he takes in the way Baekhyun’s gaze falls from his face. The ever present urge to erase the creases between his eyebrows is back.

“It’s no big deal.” The words leave his drying mouth quickly, his hands reach out even quicker, landing gently on his lover’s slender shoulders. And then those addicting, dark orbs are back on him, stealing the air from his lungs as if his oxygen belonged to him in the first place. Those electric eyes rimmed by nothing but the kohl of restless nights enchant him easily. “I never truly minded.”

“You weren’t ever curious about her?” The smaller male peers up to scan the redhead’s expression. He feels a weight lift off his heart for a split second before it drops all the way down to his stomach again when he deduces that the taller doesn’t look particularly affected by Baekhyun’s nosiness, in fact his features are locked in a neutral, unmoving expression: the same one he wears all day in and out. Suddenly Baekhyun feels as though he were in bed with a complete stranger. Chanyeol was never like this before.

This is your fault.

“My father met her during his travels, they had a whirlwind romance but it wasn't to last. He left her within the same week that he met her. He visited her a year later and by then I’d already been born. My mother refused to keep looking after me without him by her side, said I only brought her pain by reminding her of my father. My father wasn’t the type to settle down, the sea was everything for him and while I don’t doubt he loved my mother, he couldn’t give that up for anything." Both the boys know the full extent of what the captain would sacrifice to keep himself out at sea. "And so he took me onboard with him and we sailed away forever. I don't know what became of her, partly because my father never seemed to want to speak about her and partly because I never really bothered to ask.” Chanyeol shrugs, eyes that were usually so alive and animated looking horribly empty in the dark lighting. “What about yours?”

Baekhyun’s hardly thinking when the words flow out of his mouth, barely even feels the sting. “She died when I was young.” His gaze never leave his lover who grows colder and colder under his fingertips with every passing second. 

“I’m sorry,” Chanyeol’s soft baritone washes over his exposed skin, his digits even softer against the flesh he in soothing circular motions in an attempt to comfort him. Baekhyun doesn’t think he’s the one who requires comforting here. “What was she like?” His touch is like ice against his body but Baekhyun refuses to complain.

“Kind. Sweet. Beautiful,” he answers, pain bleeding into his expression for entirely unrelated reasons. He doesn't know why his chest feels so tight, why he feels like he’s the only one who cares. He knows he should be content with just this, knows he should let Chanyeol take things at his own pace and be thankful the latter even lets him so close to him at all. But still he hopes. He hopes to be closer. Such hope - such longing - is what drives him to release a harrowing sigh and shake his head, changing at such a rate that even Chanyeol begins to frown down at him. “Why are you making this about me again?”

“Because I’m curious,” Chanyeol replies so easily. So detached. Words nothing but sounds to him, cheap and lightweight as he flings whatever he can at Baekhyun to pacify him. The dark haired male only shakes his head more vigourously, pushing the other body away and creating some space between the two of them. Unease settles itself into Chanyeol’s expression, a flash of defensiveness sweeps into his eyes and Baekhyun wishes to rewind time. Further back. So far back that he has the option of not accepting Chanyeol into his life if he wanted it.

( He could never want it. )

He feels like he's going crazy. It must be the voices in his head. He feels like he's running out of time.

This is your fault.

In the end, he's only frustrated at himself.

“I’m curious about you too. You know more about me than I know about you, so spill.”

“Baekhyun-“

“Why are you running away?” Chanyeol flinches, not at his lover's brash tone but at the way he hardens his exterior: eyes darkening a shade, voice dropping an octave. Baekhyun's always been so rash with his emotions, has always allowed his agitation to escalate into anger and lashes out at anyone and anything within reach. He’s not mastered it yet: putting his demons behind him. Understanding Chanyeol. He’s not even close.

“Mr Bigshot, Captain of the Merida - you shouldn’t be a stranger to the spotlight. Is it because you have some deep, awful secret you don’t want to share with m