Your eyes snapped open and your body tensed as you suddenly woke up to unfamiliar surroundings. Then soreness and discomfort made their presence known and you groaned quietly. Looking around, you found yourself alone in a plain white hospital room. The rapidly beeping monitors next to you were slowly producing a more relaxed rhythm as you calmed down. You looked yourself over, unsurprised that you had bandages everywhere. The stab wound to your stomach and the gashes on your left arm were sutured and bruising slightly. Some of the bruises you had looked days old.

Suddenly there were crashing sounds in the hallway and the clear footsteps of someone running at full speed. Your door abruptly flew open. Jongup stood at the threshold, breathing heavily with his green tinted eyes set in an expression of worry. There was an increased beeping from the monitors next to you, but you didn’t pay any attention to that. There was nothing more important than the man still standing at the doorway.

“Jongup…” You tried to reach out to him, but both of your arms felt heavy and sore, not to mention tangled up in the IV system. It frustrated you that you couldn’t go to him. You needed to feel him; to make sure he was really alright.

He whispered your name as he slowly walked in. Jongup’s gaze was looking you over. He had been by your side as much as possible while you were unconscious; now he wanted to make sure you hadn’t had any changes before he touched you. His nerves were on edge. Could he even touch you? Were you stable enough to handle whatever his Skill would create next? “Hey…” He stopped at the edge of your bed, just out of your reach. “How are you feeling?”

You let out a whine in your head. Why was he being like this? “I feel fabulous. Please come closer.” Your voice was raspy and dry, making it difficult to talk. When he didn’t move you felt tears prick at your eyes. “What’s going on?”

Seeing how distressed you were made him distressed in return. “I’m so happy to see you awake. You’ve been out for a few days now.”

“You don’t look happy.” You mumbled, laboriously wiping away an escaped tear. You tried to sit up better and immediately regretted moving, letting out a hiss at the pain you felt. Jongup jumped slightly, his hands rising a bit due to his innate need to help you in any way he could.

“What if they can’t handle it? … But I need to make sure they’re okay…” You could hear the internal struggle he was having, but you didn’t understand. There was still a haze over your senses, dulling your perception.

“Whatever it is, please don’t worry about it. I feel like I’m dying, Jongup please…” By now you gave up the battle of wiping away the tears that seemed determined to fall down your cheeks. You raised one hand again, reaching for him through the pain. Not being able to touch him was more painful than anything your body could create.

Jongup seemed to finally realize this and sighed. He moved closer and sat on the edge of your bed. He held your face in both hands, rubbing the tears away with his thumbs while he looked into your eyes. You felt your body come alive as energy coursed through you at his touch. You leaned into one of his hands while you returned his gaze. Even he was looking emotional and that had you concerned. Eventually he closed his eyes and leaned his forehead against yours. “I was sure that I was going to lose you.” You shook your head slightly from side to side in reassurance that you were still there. “You had lost a lot of blood. Your wounds were bad. There were still robots in the castle, but I didn’t even care. Youngjae helped get you on my back and Daehyun helped Hold you together until we could make it here. You’ve been out for over three days. I was starting to think you’d never wake up-”

“Jongup,” you interrupted his anxious rambling, “breathe, it’s alright. I’m alright.” You tilted your head slightly to kiss his lips. “Thank you for saving me. I love you.” A ripple of energy went through you and you jumped a bit.

He jumped slightly as well. “I love you.” He moved to kiss you back slowly, lingering with his lips against yours. His hands moved from your cheeks down to your shoulders. He moved to you, pulling you into a gentle hug as the kiss ended. You rested your head at his shoulder and held onto him with one hand.

***

~2 months later~

You left the council room more bored than you had ever been in your life. As the city began to recover from Tera’s rule, they had decided to make you interim leader. You had reluctantly agreed only until someone better was found. Together with your friends and some additional advisors, you had begun rebuilding the city. Since the city was practically a utopia before the bombs hit, you figured it would be relatively easy to get things rolling again. And you were partially right. Everyone was eager to get back to enjoying life rather than fearing it. But there were bumps along the way- money, time, differences of opinion, clashing desires… It was enough to tire anyone out.

The warm night air pushed against you as you walked the route to your apartment. You had moved out of the hideout once you were better, saying that you didn’t want to overstay your welcome. The boys had respected your decision and let you leave, confident they would see you again anyway. Except one person was not so eager to let you out of his sight.

“Long meeting, huh?” You looked up, a smile already starting to show on your face as you saw Jongup coming down the outside stairs. He met you at the bottom and you fell against him and hugged him at the same time. He laughed and hugged you back.

“Long, but we got some more stuff figured out, so that’s cool I guess.” You closed your eyes, inhaling his comforting scent as you Synced with him. Now you could finally breathe. Well, it wasn’t that you were unable to breathe before; more like it was even better now. All of your senses were stronger when you were together.

“That’s awesome.” He hugged you extra tight before letting go and grabbing your hand. “Come on, I want to show you something.” He chuckled at your confused expression and just pulled you along.

You walked together for a while until you reached the city wall. He let go and began to climb up, using the old remnants of wall nearby. It felt awfully familiar. “What are you doing?”

“Come on, I wanna show you something!” Jongup got to the top and looked down at you with excitement.

You shook your head and grinned, climbing up after him. You sat next to him and glanced around. “Okay? What’s up?” He pointed up and you looked toward the sky. Suddenly the sky was alight with shooting stars as a meteor shower started. You were stunned into silence for a moment before you grabbed his jacket sleeve, tugging on it excitedly.

“I was really hoping the timing would work out.” He laughed at your reaction and watched you watch the sky for a moment before watching it himself.

“You did a good job.” You leaned on his shoulder, relaxing into him as he put his arm around you. You were content. Yeah, there was a lot to do still, but things would work out. And with Jongup by your side, you were confident that you would get through it.

★☆★☆★☆

Author's Note: hello! This was the final chapter~ thank you for following me on this journey. I explored a new genre and really liked it. Let me know what you think, if you want to. Love & respect, -Sera