< He’s gone. >

< I’ll be right there. >

MinWoo arrived at the apartment in record time. It seemed like it’d be a strange thing, for a customer and a veterinarian to have a friendship of this sort. But as soon as TaekWoon pushed open the door and MinWoo laid eyes on him, he brought the giant youngster into a tight hug, not even leaving the doorway. TaekWoon was glad for the action, but it just brought forth more tears to his eyes, and he hunched over MinWoo as he let himself go. The vet kept a firm hold on TaekWoon as he slowly maneuvered them back into the apartment, shutting the front door.

When TaekWoon managed to calm down a fraction, MinWoo pulled back a bit but kept his hands solidly on TaekWoon’s shaking shoulders. “Can I see him?”

TaekWoon kept his arms tightly bound across his own chest as he led MinWoo to his bedroom. He couldn’t move much closer than the door, though, so MinWoo walked past him and only stopped just a step ahead. TaekWoon hadn’t moved HakYeon from how he found him.

“Oh, kid…” MinWoo sighed. TaekWoon attempted to muffle another sob as MinWoo continued into the room, stopping on TaekWoon’s side of the bed so he could gaze at HakYeon’s serene face. He didn’t take more than a glance for permission, and he slowly sat on the bed and reached out just to move HakYeon’s hair from his brow.

JaeHwan and SangHyuk arrived a bit later but at the same time, oddly enough, but the first thing heard from their arrival was a yelp from WonShik as the door opened, and the hybrid was a blur rushing past MinWoo who had opened the front door. WonShik bounded onto the bed right next to HakYeon and clutched the still hands, whimpering and crying loudly. SangHyuk was close on his heels, but he stopped when he spotted TaekWoon who had moved to sit in the chair at his desk.

“Hyung…” SangHyuk’s voice cracked, so TaekWoon just stood to bring him into a hug. They were never the touchy-feely type of friends, but SangHyuk wrapped his arms around TaekWoon like he wouldn’t let go anytime soon.

JaeHwan and HongBin stepped into the room next, and HongBin – eyes wide and mouth pressed to a flat line – cautiously moved to the bed, ignoring the humans in the room. He sat on HakYeon’s other side but did nothing more, his expression a forced blank. JaeHwan approached TaekWoon and SangHyuk, but the two didn’t even separate and just drew the supervisor into a group hug. The friends didn’t say anything, only sniffling and WonShik’s sobbing filling in the silence.

Even some of the staff from MinWoo’s clinic popped in, probably at MinWoo’s request. TaekWoon was a bit surprised to see the first girl – SoYeon – and the tall guy – whatever his name was – cautiously enter his room. They looked nervous, too, bowing their heads a bit when they saw TaekWoon. But they slowly walked over to the bed, slowly since WonShik and HongBin gave them suspicious glances. TaekWoon called them off, though, and SoYeon gingerly ran her hand through HakYeon’s hair. She came away from it a few minutes later with tears streaming down her face, and the two made sure to offer their condolences to TaekWoon before they left.

“Thank you,” TaekWoon said to MinWoo, later. “For everything. For everything from the start.”

SangHyuk and WonShik were the last to go – aside from MinWoo. SangHyuk had only just managed to finally coax WonShik to let go of HakYeon’s hands and get off the bed, but WonShik had next latched onto TaekWoon, and SangHyuk ended up pulling the sleepy-eyed hybrid away. TaekWoon gave WonShik as much of a smile as he could muster and patted him on the head. WonShik pressed his head into TaekWoon’s hand and muttered a gravelly, “Sorry…” Then he slumped against SangHyuk who waved one last time before they left the apartment.

MinWoo nodded. “I’m glad I could be a part of it.”

Suddenly, TaekWoon let out a weak snort which caused MinWoo to look at him quizzically. “I just realized… Not once have I ever paid you.”

MinWoo’s brows lifted. “You’re really thinking about that right now? Do you want to pay?” TaekWoon just shook his head, and MinWoo grinned. “Your transformation is payment enough for me.”

TaekWoon pondered over that statement. It was true. When he thought back to when he first met HakYeon, his mindset was completely different. His original mentality that hybrids were more animal than human and didn’t, couldn’t, possibly keep up with human privileges transformed to the complete opposite. And he had shut off his emotions, affected by what he had branded as a betrayal and thus hardening to an emotionless lobster. At the time, he hadn’t realized he would end up giving his heart to something—someone else. He hadn’t realized just how much of his heart he would give.

MinWoo brought HakYeon’s remains to TaekWoon the next day, sealed in a wooden box with a minimalist floral design carved into the top, just small enough for TaekWoon to wrap his arms around. Wordless, TaekWoon stood there, holding HakYeon’s ashes to his body. He vaguely remembered MinWoo asking if he needed anything, but he had said no, there was food in the fridge and JaeHwan’s instructions to call or text when he was ready to come back to work. After the door closed, TaekWoon walked the few steps back into his apartment and sank to the living room floor, still clutching HakYeon against him.

He didn’t remember doing a lot of things. Waking up, usually. Falling asleep somewhere but somehow waking up elsewhere. He could have sworn he’d fallen asleep on the sofa, but he was somehow waking up on his bed. Empty, next to him. TaekWoon rolled over and crushed his face into HakYeon’s pillow and cried until he couldn’t breathe.

He found that he felt a bit better when he took HakYeon outside with him. He sat at the park one day when the weather was fair, sat on a bench where he sat before and had watched HakYeon chase after bugs like a child, HakYeon’s box perched beside him. He would open the window by the table in his apartment and listen to the outside world as he slowly sipped water from a mug, HakYeon’s box on the table across from him. When he slept, he dreamed of glittering eyes and could almost feel the thump of a tail against his mattress. He woke with a start, saw emptiness beside him, and felt the world crushing him all over again.

It was an amount of time, neither large nor small, that TaekWoon found he was breathing again. At some point he had just shown up to work, and JaeHwan had been shocked to even see TaekWoon sitting at his desk. But he had said nothing and set a mug of coffee by the computer monitor. SangHyuk was there, too, one day, and they went out to eat ramyun. SangHyuk had asked if TaekWoon wanted another serving. TaekWoon said no, but SangHyuk ordered another one, anyway. (SangHyuk had to finish the second serving, regardless.)

He could breathe in the outside world. But his bed was empty, and TaekWoon kept dreaming of glittering eyes and a sunshine smile. If JaeHwan or SangHyuk tried asking how TaekWoon was or even vaguely mentioning HakYeon, TaekWoon would choke up and refuse to speak. JaeHwan would go back to his desk, and SangHyuk would trail off back to his dorm while TaekWoon would hold in his emotions until he was able to shut the front door behind him so that no one would see him fall apart.

He tried closing off his emotions again.

It was raining, that day. And the weather was starting to change. People zipped by in a hurry to get to their destinations as dry as possible. TaekWoon didn’t know why they never carried umbrellas or rain coats. That’s why they were invented, after all.

He strolled slowly in his rain coat and holding up his umbrella, watching the sidewalk move backwards as he took each step forward. He continued along the path, per usual, but randomly, without thinking, he turned down an alleyway. It deviated from his usual route home, but there was no incentive for arriving home anytime soon.

The sound of a sneeze made him pause.

Looking over, it was an alley where the back doors of the strip of shops along the street led. A few of the back doors had no cover, but one shop had the foresight to put up a small awning above the door. Maybe for when a worker would decide to take a smoke break.

Pressed against the wall underneath the awning was a small figure.

Maybe he wasn’t small, but he had curled himself up enough into a tight, crouching ball that TaekWoon seemed to think he was small. His first thought was that it was a kid, maybe a runaway or something. The sight of pointed ears poking through his copper-colored hair proved otherwise.

He didn’t know if he was ready to jump into this spiral once more. He should have backed away, saved himself from the heartache he would surely have to endure all over again. The hybrid sniffled and tried to bring his legs closer to his body. The awning was just too short, TaekWoon noticed, the rain catching on the hybrid’s shoes.

Glittering eyes. A sunshine smile.

When the rain suddenly stopped falling onto the hybrid’s toes, he blinked in surprise, a bit confused. Then he noticed the person standing above him, his umbrella tilted so that it shielded the rain away from the both of them. The hybrid stared, apprehensive at first, but then his tail came out from where it had been curled around the kid’s bottom, and it gave a small, hopeful swish.

TaekWoon took a deep breath, coughed, and cleared his throat.

“Do you… want to go with me?”

A/N: Congratulations and also apologies uwu This is the fic that gets the bad ending. Tbh I had this ending planned out since the beginning. Cries.

Writing this was a bit of a task since my brother's 1-yr old puppy passed away in the middle of writing. And bringing up HakYeon's illness and etc just brought the waterworks back all over again. Plz don't forget to cherish your fuzzy kids.

There's still a couple of FFs I want to attach here, so look forward to it as well as my future writing ventures (y'know, given that I don't drop off the face of the Earth again orz).

Oh btw I made an AO3. Zaxaryah. Look me up. I'm just cross posting stuff for now, and I haven't decided if I'll make a full move over there or not.