A/N: Ah, this is based on the song 'Still alive' and it honestly has nothing to do with Todae, and it's mostly about Jiyong writing it and thinking about Daesung, too, considering they were the ones who were mostly beaten down by the media at the time.

It's mostly a character study on our boy G-Dragon, I would say.

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2011 

Jiyong had spent his entire life with one only goal in his head: becoming a star, becoming the G-Dragon he’d always had in his mind since he was too young to remember him, expressing his own self and becoming an entirely different person, someone people would look up at, would admire and maybe even fear; he’d spent half of his childhood training and doing everything that was in his power to please president Yang, because he really wanted a chance to snatch his part of fame, to be somebody, to be seen.

He had to go through many things he didn’t like, he’d had to accept four other members when he’d really only wanted one (even if he had to make president Yang promise that he would become the leader, saying that he couldn’t do anything differently, or he would lose him, and, strangely enough, the man had accepted when he could’ve thrown him out; maybe he’d understood that he needed someone like him if he wanted to gain success for his production company), he had to fight for what he wanted; right now he felt like he’d almost reached what he was aiming for, but not quite, he’d barely reached the sky and his star was still away from him.
 
He’d spent his entire life almost afraid of what people thought of him, scared they would always see only him and never G-Dragon, someone that had always looked down on him, someone who was better than him; he’d always known there was a moment when he would have to keep a certain balance between them, or he would lose himself into his own act.

But now, everything had changed, he wasn’t scared anymore, he just didn’t give a damn; he’d had enough. He’d had enough and he wanted to let people see that their actions had consequences, he wanted to let people see that he wasn’t going to keep silent and ignore how much they’d hurt him, them; or, at least, how much they’d tried to hurt them.

He didn’t care what they thought of him, he knew who he was, he knew who he wanted to be and he was going to keep fighting like he always had; he’d spent too much time writing songs for other people. He knew it was time to write one for himself, to show the world that even if they’d tried to kill him, he wasn’t going to die; that he wasn’t going to hide, that he wasn’t going to run, that he wasn’t going to cry, that he didn’t care.
 
The reason why he half-kidnapped Daesung one day (earning himself and completely ignoring the deadly glare Seunghyun sent his way) to bring him into the studio and show him the songs he’d written, had everything to do with that; after all, he was the member he felt closer to, in that moment, because of everything the two of them had to go through in that past year, because of how they’d been hated, forgotten and abandoned. In reality, those songs were for him, too; they were for both of them, he wanted to show the world that they were strong and would always fight to stay alive, together with the others.
 
“I wrote a song.” he said, making the younger sit down and basically shoving the paper on his face, feeling half-embarrassed and half-thrilled, since he really wanted to know what he thought about them and, even if he had decided he didn’t care what people thought about his songs, the opinion of his bandmates still mattered a lot, considering they would have to sing them, too; he observed as the other’s eyes skimmed over the page, extremely focused on understanding the meaning.

He knew it wasn’t difficult, it was literally out there for everyone to see, he hadn’t used metaphors or analogies, he had stated everything clearly, because he was tired and wanted everyone to see.

When Daesung finally finished reading, he didn’t say anything for several seconds, seemingly speechless; the leader was afraid his words had been too overwhelming for him, so he reached out and lightly touched the other’s hand, trying to calm him down or at least to snap him out of his trance.
 
“Why are showing it to me?” the younger asked after a second, recovering from his initially confused and shocked state, and looking at him for a moment, as if he really couldn’t understand the reason why he’d showed the song to him first and not directly to everyone; what did he think, that he could forget what he’d gone through and only care about himself?

It had been a few though months for him, but he kept thinking that what had happened to him was nothing against what had happened to Daesung; maybe that was the reason why he’d tried to help him as much as he could when he’d just came back, had always tried to talk to him even when he didn’t want to and had stayed with him even when he’d told him he was fine over and over.
 
“Because I want the world to know that they haven’t killed us, that we don’t need them, that we’ve survived and we’re going to be okay.” he said in a breath, without stopping, afraid the words were going to slip away from his mind as quickly as he’d thought them; he’d always expressed himself better through music and written feelings than with spoken words, and it’d been a miracle if he’d managed to say what he wanted to say.

He believed everything that he’d said, he believed everything that he’d written for the song, he believed that everything would be better, he believed that everything was already better; and he wasn’t going to keep silent, this time, he was going to scream what he thought, how he felt, he was going to make everyone listen and realise what an awful mistake some people had done.

He was going to live up to his name; he wasn’t Kwon Jiyong anymore, he was G-Dragon, he was the one looking down on other people now, he was looking down on himself, on the person he’d been. And a dragon doesn’t fear anyone or anybody, a dragon doesn’t run away, a dragon doesn’t hide; a dragon makes himself be feared.
 
All the people who had thought they could say anything they wanted about him, about Daesung, about their group, were going to realise that he knew what they’d done, he was perfectly aware of the way they’d tried to ruin his imagine and that they hadn’t succeeded; he was going to be honest, and tell them that he’d cried, tell them that he’d suffered because of them, but now, he wasn’t afraid anymore, now he was laughing at them, now he was going to do everything they tried to stop him from doing. He was going to keep reaching for the star that so rightfully belonged to him and no one was going to stop him; he was alive, more alive than he’d ever been.

They’d thought they could destroy him, but he was going to come back stronger; Bigbang were going to come back stronger than ever, because now they knew that the world was cruel and they would be prepared.
 
He looked at the other, who was still blinking at him, less confused but still speechless; after a moment, he realised there were tears in his eyes and that he was trying to hold them back.

Taking a sudden decision, he reached out again and grabbed his hand, showing him that he was there and he would always be; Daesung seemed to understand, because he smiled softly and Jiyong realised that he wasn’t sad, he was really overwhelmed by his words, maybe because he could feel them as well as he’d had when he’d written them, maybe because he’d given him hope for their future. In that moment, the leader thought that he didn’t care who he was, the person he had always been or the star he was becoming, because as long as he could say something to the people around him with his songs, he already had everything he could have.
 
‘Even if everyone leaves, even if everyone turns against me
Even if you take pity over my pathetic self
The world tells me that I can’t but
The crying me of the past is now smiling’