Sehun has never been this far down into the belly of the ship. On the very first day of their long journey his father sat him down and said “You are not to leave levels one and two of the ship, do you understand?” Sehun didn’t understand why he couldn’t leave the upper two levels but he nodded and told his father that he did anyways despite his confusion.

Now only a short three months into their journey Sehun finds himself descending the staircase, the elevator is always too busy with men who would tell his father of his wrongdoings in a heartbeat, and heading down to the lower levels of the ship.

Sehun wrings his hands nervously as he passes the silver placard declaring him now on the third level of the ship. He stops momentarily losing his nerve. If he turns back now his father will never find out and definitely won’t punish him but if he doesn’t keep going then his curiosity will only continue to grow larger until he goes ahead and heads down to the lower levels anyway.

So Sehun keeps descending the stairs, down, down, down until he feels the air begin to grow colder the lower he goes.

It’s not until Sehun reaches the end of the stairs does he start to get truly nervous. It’s freezing down here more so then he has ever felt on the upper levels of the ship. His skin feels like ice and he’s now standing on the outside of a door that leads to where, Sehun doesn’t know.

Sehun stands there staring at the shiny metal door for what seems like an eternity before he reaches out and grasps the long handle in his hand. It’s warm to the touch which surprises Sehun since the air is so cold.

Sehun takes a deep breath, shoving his father’s words to the back of his mind, before turning the handle to left and pushing the door open.

The door swings inward revealing a small ten by ten room with absolutely nothing inside except another door directly opposite from the door Sehun just opened. The door is silver and shiny, the same as the door Sehun just swung open. Sehun enters the room shutting the door behind him as quietly as he can just in case some of his fathers men, the crew of the ship, are on the stairs where they could possibly hear. Inside the room with the door shut behind him, Sehun feels enclosed. He doesn’t like the feeling, not one bit. The room is cool but not as cold as the stairwell had been. The lights are a bit dull but other than that it’s just like any other empty room on the ship. Only Sehun feels that something is off about this particular empty room.

Sehun stands in the middle of the room torn between going through the next door and turning and running back to his rooms on level one. Obviously the safe option for Sehun is just to turn and leave but that’s not what he does. His curiosity is driving him forward toward the second door.

Sehun is in front of the door in two strides, his hand already grasping the knob and turning before he can think better of it. The door swings open. The automatic lights flicker before coming on and blinding Sehun.

Sehun’s jaw drops at what lies before him.

“Sehun come here!”

Sehun races across the field running to his friend. “What is it?” Sehun asks merrily as he slows to see what it is his friend called him over for.

Sehun’s friend opens his semi-clenched hand to reveal a beautiful butterfly. “Isn’t is pretty?” His friends stares longingly at the butterfly sitting gently on his palm.

Sehun stares down at the small insect in awe never having seen one with it’s coloring in all his eighteen years before this day. “It’s magnificent,” Sehun breathes out. It really is too, it’s mainly black but it’s markings are purple, blue, and green.

Sehun watches the butterfly crawl from his friends palm and make it’s way up his forearm. “It reminds me of you,” Sehun’s friend says as the butterfly starts to flutter its wings slightly as if it’s going to fly away, it doesn’t fly away to Sehun’s relief.

“How so?” Sehun asks not taking his eyes off the beautiful creature.

“It’s rare and beautiful,” his friends says. “Just like you.”

Sehun looks away from the butterfly to see his friend staring at him. “Don’t leave me Sehun,” he says sadness clouding his features. “Please.”

“I have to,” Sehun says mournfully. “You know how my father is. I already tried to speak--”

The butterfly suddenly takes flight, quick and gracefully. The two of them watch it fly away until it is too far away for them to see it any longer.

“Sehun--” his friend chokes on whatever is is he is about to say.

Sehun reaches out and places his hand softly upon his friends cheek. “Zitao,” Sehun says softly. “I will never forget you.”

Zitao is crying now, silent tears that hold so much emotion. “Please don’t leave me here all alone Sehun. Don’t you know how much you mean to me? You’re all I have.”

Sehun feels his heart crack from Zitao’s desperate words. Sehun doesn’t know how to reply to him so instead he pulls Zitao against him. His lips fall on Zitao’s lips softly, as soft as the butterfly’s steps upon Zitao’s palm, softly, yet passionate too.

This is Sehun’s goodbye to Zitao.

Zitao is still crying but that doesn’t stop Sehun from deepening the kiss knowing it’s the last one the two will ever share. Zitao goes slack within Sehun’s arm but Sehun easily holds Zitao’s weight like it’s nothing.

Sehun deepens the kiss even more putting everything he has felt for Zitao in the last five years into it. Heat flares in his stomach and his heart alike filling him with desperate need.

“SEHUN!”

Zitao breaks the kiss by jumping away from Sehun. Zitao looks guilty for no reason, his hand hovers just above his swollen lips.

Sehun turns away from Zitao reluctantly to see his father racing across the field toward him.

“Sehun stop messing around with lowly people, it’s time to go.” Sehun’s father’s voice is cold just as cold as his heart.

Sehun turns to look at Zitao over his shoulder. “Goodbye dear friend,” Sehun says softly, barely keeping his composure at this point.

Sehun turns back around and starts to walk away from Zitao but not before he feels a cold hand on his elbow pulling him backwards.

“Sehun wait,” Zitao says desperately.

Sehun turns to face him feeling the dull burn of tears behind his eyes.

“I-- I love you,” Zitao whispers as fresh tears spring from his eyes. Zitao reaches into his pocket and places something heavy in Sehun’s palm. “Keep this to remember me,” he says closing Sehun’s hand around the smooth object. “I love you,” Zitao says once more.

“SEHUN!” Sehun’s father barks at him from behind. “Stop dawdling it’s time to go.”

Sehun turns his back on Zitao, his hand clenched tightly around the object, the only thing keeping him from bursting into tears, and walks away. But just as Sehun reaches his father he turns around to look at Zitao one last time. Zitao is sobbing into his hands quietly now and it breaks Sehun’s heart.

“Zitao,” Sehun says loud enough for him to hear from so far away. “I love you.”

The last thing Sehun sees before his father wraps his large hand around Sehun’s upper arm and pulls him harshly away from the field is Zitao’s sad teary smile.

Sehun’s father drags Sehun through the forest and back towards the city, back towards the giant space craft that will take Sehun away from Zitao forever.

Sehun doesn’t look at the object grasped in his hand, not until the ship is hours away from the Earth.

Sehun reaches up and rubs the blue-green cat’s eye pendant that hangs from a cheap chain around his neck. Never did he think he would see the person who gave it to him again. Turns out Sehun was dead wrong.

Sehun takes a step into the large room not truly believing what his eyes are seeing. He’s hoping that he is just having a really vivid nightmare right now and that none of this is real, it can’t be.

Inside the room are rows and rows, dozens of them, of cryogenic chambers and they aren’t empty, no, there are people, real people inside them.

Sehun doesn’t care about that though, his eyes are glued to one cryogenic chamber in particular.

Sehun steps closer to the chamber that sits only five in, the closest row to the door, and can’t really believe it.

Sehun stops a foot away from the chamber and stares through the glass at a boy who looks startlingly like his Zitao. “It can’t be,” Sehun says out loud as if that will make his words true.

But it is Zitao, unless he has a twin he never told Sehun about it. Sehun squints looking into the chamber trying hard to find something, some little difference that will prove this isn’t Zitao in front of him, frozen. He doesn’t find one, matter of fact the more he stares the more it really looks like Zitao.

It is Zitao.

The door behind him slams open hitting the wall loudly behind Sehun. Sehun doesn’t turn away from the cryogenic chamber though, can’t tear his gaze away from Zitao’s frozen body.

“Sehun,” his father’s voice is still rigid even though he has to know this is not the time to be heartless.

“What the is this?” Sehun asks numbly. He still doesn’t turn away from Zitao.

“Sehun,” His fathers voice is hard. “I told you not to leave levels one and two what are you doing down here?”

Sehun ignores the question. “Why is Zitao frozen down here?” Sehun’s palms are flat agains the galss as he gazes in at Zitao’s lifeless looking body.

“Sehun let’s talk about this upstairs,” Sehun’s father tries to reason.

“No,” Sehun spits. “Unfreeze him now.” Sehun removes one hand from the glass to rub the pendant sitting on his chest trying to calm himself down. It seems to work, a little.

“Sehun I can’t do that,” his father says slowly.

The softness in his father’s voice stuns Sehun. “Why not?” Sehun asks letting his voice soften slightly.

“Because if he’s awoken early he will die,”

Sehun’s blood freezes in his veins. “What?” he asks dumbly.

Sehun hears his father walking towards him but he still doesn’t turn away from Zitao.

“Sehun let me explain,” his father says placing his hands on Sehun’s shoulders.

Sehun stays silent waiting for his father’s explanation.

“There were a lot of people who wanted to go to the new planet with us but they didn’t have the money to board the ship like the rest of us,” Sehun’s father takes a deep breath before he continues. “We decided that it was unfair so we held a raffle. A few hundred people were chosen at random to come along with us to the new planet but there was a cost for them even though they won a free trip. The cost was for them to be frozen for the five year journey. The timers to unfreeze them, wake them up, are set to a few days after when we are supposed to land on the planet Sehun, which means if they are woken up prematurely they will go into shock and die.”

Sehun stays silent trying to make sense of what his father just told him. “They will all be alright though right? Even after five years spent almost dead?” Sehun asks after a few moments silence.

Sehun’s father shakes his head. “Another cost, we never fully got the opportunity to test cryogenic freezing so we don’t exactly know what the consequences of being frozen for so long will be, at least until they wake up.”

Sehun feels his knees weaken from the weight of what he just learned. It takes him a few minutes before he can find his voice again. “So Zitao could be damaged?”

Sehun’s father nods sadly. “I’m sorry Sehun, I was hoping you wouldn’t have to find out about him.”

Sehun feels numb from the tip of his head all the way to his toes. His father pulls him away from Zitao and and starts leading him back upstairs.

Soon Sehun is tucked into his bed a warm cup of tea on the bedside table. He doesn’t even remember how he got there. He sits up and takes a long sip of the tea before letting himself collapse against the pillows.

For a moment hope blooms fresh and new in Sehun’s chest. Zitao and himself could be together on the new planet, if Zitao is alright that is.

Sehun’s hope is crushed in mere seconds, his father didn’t sound too convinced about the cryogenic chambers being safe and he didn’t try to reassure his son even a little.

Sehun cries himself into a deep fitful sleep only waking when he cries out for Zitao covered in slick sweat and tears.

The weeks after Sehun’s discovery Sehun keeps to his rooms. He knows he can’t stay there for the rest for their journey but Sehun can’t face his father or any of the other crew members, at least not until his pain subsides. Even then, he won’t be able look at his father the same.

Sehun finds himself pacing outside his tent waiting for news, good news he hopes.

An hour later Sehun is still pacing though his steps have slowed. His father descends the steps of the ship and approaches him slowly. He isn’t smiling.

“Sehun,” he greets.

Sehun bows his head and looks past his father waiting for the others, the ones who were frozen, to also exit the ship.

Sehun’s father glances over his shoulder and sighs turning back to Sehun. “Not all of them made the unfreezing,” he says.

Sehun suddenly feels like he’s breathing in water. He manages somehow to gasp out a single name. “Zitao?”

Sehun father doesn’t say anything just pats Sehun on the shoulder and walks away from the ship and back towards their small camp.

Just then people, dazed and confused, begin to step down the stairs of the ship one by one. They look pale and sickly but it’s expected after being frozen for so long.

Sehun searches every face waiting for Zitao, hoping that Zitao is one of the ones who made it.

Twenty minutes later the people stop coming from the ship. Sehun feels the tears slip silently down his cheeks as all his hope quickly depletes.

Sehun waits another five minutes not wanting to believe that Zitao didn’t make it but then he has no choice but to turn and walk away from the ship with the others. They have a lot to do on this new planet and Sehun can’t sit around waiting for someone who didn’t make it. Sehun can’t be useless even in his time of grief.

Five steps Sehun stops sensing something.

“Sehun?”

Sehun turns disbelieving.

“Zitao?”

Zitao is running down the steps to the ship at him faster than Sehun has ever seen him move before.

“Sehun!”

Sehun takes off in a sprint toward Zitao. The close the distance between each other within seconds. Sehun runs right into Zitao’s wide open arms and hugs him as tight as he can not really believing that he is really there.

“Zitao,” Sehun whispers. Sehun’s hands are all over Zitao’s face making sure that Zitao is solid and real. Zitao is really there with him and alive albeit pale and tired looking.

They break apart after minutes of hugging and crying. Sehun can’t help but cry tears of happiness as he stares at Zitao, Zitao who’s a year older than him, Zitao whom he loves.

“Sehun,” Zitao whispers.

Sehun smiles a real smile for the first time since boarding the ship five years ago as he grabs Zitao’s hand and leads him towards the others, toward their new home. Toward their new life together.