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jeongguk is late—again.
he tries not to make it a habit, but he loses track of time watching anime (again) and only remembers he has somewhere to be when his phone starts ringing and his stomach drops upon seeing the familiar name on the screen.
“you’re late,” says seokin when jeongguk picks up, already desperately running around his room to grab his suit, which has somehow gone missing over the weekend. “again.”
“i know!” shouts jeongguk, panicking as he throws his bedsheets one way and his laundry another, digging through his backpack and his usual bag for his suit only to find it empty. “i’m sorry, hyung, but i’m on my way!”
“are you sure you wanna lie to me?”
“i’m really, seriously—jesus, fuck, where is it—”
“where is what? your suit? jeongguk, seriously—”
“no, i didn’t lose my suit! i would never, hyung. i know how much money and time and effort went into making it and i’m so grateful that you took that time for me because i would be nowhere without you, obviously, and i love you like, more than i love big tid—”
“it’s under your bed.”
jeongguk pauses, turning around to look at his bed. quickly, he gets on his knees and peers underneath, indeed finding his suit shoved near the wall. “how did you know that?” he asks as he pulls the suit out from under the bed, dusting it off before he puts his phone on speaker and tosses it on the bed, tugging his clothes off as quickly as he can.
“i made it, remember?” asks seokjin.
hopping to get his socks and jeans off, jeongguk frowns at his phone. “you put a tracker in my suit?”
“how else am i supposed to keep track of you?”
“i don’t know, call me?” asks jeongguk. “or don’t track me at all? i’m twenty-one, hyung, i don’t need you to follow me around and tell me where to go all the time.”
“really?” asks seokjin. “then why are you late?”
jeongguk grumbles under his breath as he manages to get his clothes off and grabs his suit, stepping into it and yanking it on. the first time he put this particular suit on, it took him half an hour at least. these days it’s nothing but second nature, rapidly throwing supplies he thinks he might need into his backpack—snacks—before he pulls his mask on and grabs his phone again.
“i’m just saying,” says seokjin, sounding almost bored. “if you want to help me out with this stuff, kid, you have to actually be here to help me out. it doesn’t look good when i say you’ll be coming and then you don’t show up, and maybe that’s typical college kid behaviour, but i hold myself to be a very high standard and people will start thinking i don’t know how to choose my assistants well.”
“i’m not your assistant,” jeongguk huffs as he moves for the window, shimmying it open and leaning out.
“you’re kind of my assistant. you know what you definitely are, though?”
jeongguk frowns. “goodbye, hyung.”
“late, jeon jeongguk! you’re late!”
jeongguk ends the call before he can hear another word, zipping his phone into his backpack before he casts one more glance around his dorm room and then climbs out of the window, leaning against the outside sill for a second before he tells his suit to show him where he’s supposed to go and, upon seeing a light lit up in his vision, lets go of the window sill before launching himself into the air.
he closes his eyes for a moment as he begins his downward plummet, the wind whipping through the thin suit he wears. his dorm isn’t that tall, though, and he allows himself only that single moment of letting go before he opens his eyes again, aims his arm at the top of the nearest building, and shoots out a string of webbing.
jeongguk follows the path laid out for him by his suit, swinging through the streets of seoul. he’s meant to be quick, but he can’t help doing a few backflips here and there, swinging close to the ground and through traffic just to hear people shouting when they realize who it is. being a local celebrity has its downfalls, of course, but he does like this, at least: spotting a little kid who happen to be wearing a spider-man mask on a street corner, staring at him quickly approaching, and slowing down enough to hold out his hand as he swings by. he gives the kid a high-five, shooting him a finger gun on the way up as he shoots out another web and keeps swinging.
soon, kim tower comes into view, towering over half of the buildings in the city. unsurprising, considering who built it, and jeongguk uses enhanced vision in his suit to spy exactly where seokjin is within the building—top floor, his own personal office. swinging the last few blocks, jeongguk sends a web reaching for the top of the tower and swings all the way up, letting go long enough to do a back flip and land against the window with a loud thump, crouching with his hands and feet stuck to the glass.
inside, he sees seokjin standing with a few other people. they startle at the sound, but seokjin just turns to look at him with the least impressed expression jeongguk has ever seen, and then mouths something like you could have used the door, dipshit. seokjin can’t see it behind the mask, but jeongguk’s grinning.
he scales the rest of the building to get to a door, quickly joining the small group inside.
“hyung-nim!” he grins as he reaches seokjin, tugging off his mask before bowing. while he and seokjin often have a close relationship that bridges between mentorship and friendship, seokjin is still jeongguk’s hero and always has been. despite all jeongguk has seen and done, he still can’t believe that sometimes. “i’m sorry for being tardy. it won’t happen again.”
“my ass,” says seokjin, taking jeongguk’s elbow and leading him to the small group of people standing by his desk. or—jeongguk thought they were people, at least at first glance. but upon closer inspection, he sees that his assumption is incorrect. while the four strangers may look like humans, he can immediately tell they’re not from earth. despite the similar features and even clothing, their skin and hair are different—the right side of each of them is like jeongguk and seokjin’s own skin, but the left side is a darker shade of red. similarly, all of their hair is the same: the right side is a platinum blonde while the left side is red, leaving them to appear as though they’re two halves stitched together, a jarring effect.
“jeongguk,” says seokjin, gesturing to the newcomers. “this is a delegation from contraxia. they’ve been sent by their government to find and retrieve a pair of contraxians that have been hiding out on earth for the past few weeks. they’re not dangerous, but it’ll work better with my technology, so that’s why they’ve been sent to us. while they’re here, they’ll be going by human names for our own sake. isn’t that nice, jeongguk?”
“woah,” breathes jeongguk, eyes wide as he watches them. it’s not the first time he’s met aliens, but each time is a shock to remember that there isn’t just earth out there. there are whole galaxies and universes other than his own, and he’s just a tiny part of this one. jeongguk likes to think he makes a difference in his own universe just by fighting crime and helping people when they need it, but there’s so much more out there.
and it’s all fantastic.
“this is really cool,” he says, beaming as he bounces forward to meet the strangers, bowing before shaking their hands enthusiastically. there are four of them: three women and one man, the women standing taller and with the longest hair he’s ever seen. they look strangely majestic despite appearing to be human, probably trying to blend in. “i’ve always wanted to meet aliens that didn’t want to kill me.”
“jeongguk,” scolds seokjin.
“sorry, oh my god,” says jeongguk as he comes to the last alien—contraxian. it’s the man, standing just short of jeongguk himself. he has long hair, too, carefully done up with a messy bun behind his head and a few braids that weave his blonde and red hair together. for some reason, jeongguk gets stuck on that, on how pretty it is—and then he remembers he’s still holding the man’s hand, going as red as the contraxian’s left side as he snatches it away and bows again, almost to ninety degrees. “sorry. not aliens. you’re not aliens.”
“it’s okay,” says the man, and when jeongguk straighten up again, there’s an amused little grin on his lips. vaguely, jeongguk thinks that he was completely wrong about his first assumptions: while he may look like a human from afar, it’s more than just the two-toned skin that gives him away. after all, jeongguk doesn’t think he’s ever seen a human so pretty. “we’re aliens to you. but you’re aliens to us, too.”
“yeah,” breathes jeongguk, too distracted by the contraxian’s face to come up with anything intelligent to say.
there’s a beat of awkward silence where jeongguk just stands there. and then seokjin clears his throat behind him and jeongguk snaps back to reality, flushing again before he returns to seokjin’s side. “like i said,” says seokjin. “we’re going to be helping them find their missing friends. we’ve been working for the past few hours to sync our technology and they know what they’re doing, so we’re going to pair off. we know that they’re definitely in seoul, so it shouldn’t take us long to find them. jeongguk, if you break anything i give you, i’m taking away your suit.”
“hyung—!”
“i’ll be working with the delegation leader,” continues seokjin, placing his hand on jeongguk’s shoulder. when jeongguk looks at him, he’s smirking, and jeongguk’s stomach drops. he just knows that seokjin is going to try and get a little revenge for jeongguk showing up late. as much as jeongguk does love him, seokjin can be a bit of an asshole—although considering how smart, rich, good-looking, and famous he is, jeongguk supposes he can’t be blamed. “how about you work with yoongi, jeongguk?”
jeongguk turns his eyes to the three other contraxians, hoping to god one of them has decided to go with the name yoongi while they’re here. but all of them give him a vaguely blank look, and jeongguk swallows tightly as his eyes move to the last contraxian, the one he’s already made a vague fool of himself in front of him. he’s already grinning at jeongguk.
“hyung,” begins jeongguk, dread filling him, but seokjin is already shoving jeongguk toward yoongi and making his way toward the other three. “seokjin-hyung. iron man.”
“yoongi knows what he’s doing,” says seokjin, sparing him but a wink. “he’d be offended if he knew you didn’t want to work with him.”
the truth is that jeongguk doesn’t really mind—he’s happy and eager to help in any way that he can. but having to work with someone he’s already pegged as the most attractive being he’s ever seen is not going to go over well. not to mention jeongguk is gay as fuck. he doesn’t really know how gender works on contraxia, but either way, he can already feel his heartbeat quickening as he spots yoongi approaching him from the corner of his eye. god, it’s the hair. somehow, yoongi makes having two completely different coloured halves of himself look like a fantastic fashion statement.
“jeongguk?” asks yoongi, and his voice is—warm, like honey. shit. “i’m saying that right?”
jeongguk clears his throat, throwing one last glare at seokjin before turning to yoongi with a grin. “yeah,” he says. “that’s right. and you’re going by yoongi?”
“it actually doesn’t sound too different from what my actual name is,” shrugs yoongi. “and i think it’s pretty.”
“it is,” says jeongguk, and then—blanches when he realizes what he’s said, cheeks colouring immediately. yoongi chuckles at him, a sound that jeongguk suddenly wants to hear again and again. “well. anyway. working? together. we’re working together.” he cringes internally.
but yoongi just laughs again, apparently endeared by jeongguk tripping over his words. he’s usually a lot more composed and tries to be cool as well as he can—he’s spider-man for god’s sake, and everyone loves him. but that’s under the mask. when he’s trying to converse with attractive people, apparently his brain stops working. in any case, yoongi reaches out and takes his wrist (and jeongguk’s heartrate spikes just like that) before pulling him over to the desk, where a bunch of supplies have been set out: little black boxes and containers. yoongi explains what they’ll really be doing and how to use some of the technology, although says to leave it up to yoongi himself since he knows what he’s doing. as much as jeongguk wants to get his hands all over the cool technology, he knows that’s not the best idea from past experience. there’s a reason seokjin doesn’t let him play around in kim tower anymore.
for the most part, jeongguk has been recruited because he can get them to high places easily and can use some of the technology built into his own suit. yoongi will be using technology to scan the city, essentially, trying to pinpoint where the hiding contraxians might be so that one of the other teams can capture them and bring them back to the contraxian ship. it’ll admittedly be a lot of sitting around and waiting, which is both a blessing and a curse. it’ll give jeongguk time to talk to yoongi, but—it’ll also give jeongguk time to talk to yoongi. and make a fool of himself.
after briefing, the two of them stand at the edge of kim tower, overlooking the city. they think the contraxians are hiding in the northern part of the city, so they have to go there, and jeongguk, having pulled his mask on, worries at his lip as he glances over at yoongi.
“do you like, wanna take the elevator?” he asks. “that’s cool if you want to. it goes pretty fast and we can take a cab or something. i don’t have that much money, but seokjin-hyung would probably give me money if i asked him?”
“what are you talking about?” asks yoongi. “don’t you have your web things?”
“shooters,” mutters jeongguk. “yeah, but like—it’s kinda scary? if you’ve never done it, i mean. to just swing around.”
“jeongguk,” laughs yoongi, patting jeongguk’s cheek through the mask. “i work in transport for the government. i fly around in space ships and use what you’d call jet packs and zoom around space all of the time. trust me, i’m not going to get scared by your web shooters.”
for some reason, that makes jeongguk blush, just a little. maybe he wanted to seem cool in front of yoongi—wanted to impress him with his abilities, swinging through the city. but yoongi seems enthusiastic about having the chance to do all that, and that means it’s probably not the coolest thing he’s ever done. but no matter—jeongguk can also stick to walls and ceilings and has plenty of tricks in his suit to impress yoongi if he needs. not that he’s hoping he’ll have to use any of the weapons, but maybe they’ll come across a mugger he can stop along the way.
“alright, well,” says jeongguk, clearing his throat. he holds out an arm, gesturing for yoongi to come closer. “just… hold on tight, i guess.” yoongi immediately crowds into his space, body pressed against jeongguk’s, and fuck, this suit is so thin. he’s never given much thought to it, but now that yoongi is pressed against him, somehow fitting perfectly with his arms around jeongguk’s shoulders and his grinning face against jeongguk’s collarbone, jeongguk has to avert his eyes. he’s never been gladder for a mask in his entire life, knowing it can at least hide any of his blushing.
“take me to the sky, bug boy,” says yoongi.
“it’s spider-man,” huffs jeongguk.
yoongi seems to regard him before he says, “bug boy,” and then grins. despite always being adamant about using his name right, he finds he might actually be able to get used to that with yoongi. and then he shakes himself out of any of those thoughts, wraps one of his arms around yoongi’s torso to secure him, and steps off of the building.
half an hour later, the two of them sit atop a tall apartment building. jeongguk dangles his legs over the edge of the building, swinging them back and forth as he munches on some of the snacks he’s now glad he brought along. for the past twenty minutes since they got here, yoongi has been using some sort of tracking and scanning technology to search for the hiding contraxians, but nothing has happened yet. jeongguk has taken the opportunity to admire the city, the sun just beginning to set.
after another few minutes, he looks up to see yoongi joining him at the edge of the building, legs sticking out next to jeongguk’s. he’s on jeongguk’s right side, meaning all jeongguk can see of him is his red hair, red skin. in a way, it looks like a birthmark that has taken up half of his body. despite only knowing yoongi for less than an hour, he still hasn’t gotten used to it.
“find anything?” asks jeongguk.
yoongi shakes his head. “they’re hiding here for a reason,” he says. “and they definitely don’t want to be found, so they likely have some cloaking technology so that we can’t find them. that’s why we tried to fuse it with mr. kim’s technology, because they won’t know how to hide from human devices.”
jeongguk nods, turning back to look at the city. in all honesty, he probably doesn’t have to be here, but it’s a good reason to procrastinate on homework. after another minute, he holds out the bag of seaweed he’s eating, shaking it at yoongi. “want some?”
yoongi looks into the bag and then frowns. “no, thank you,” he says. “doesn’t look very appealing.”
“it’s good,” protests jeongguk.
“all of your food looks unappealing. how do you even live?”
“how do you live?” asks jeongguk. “your food can’t be that much different.”
“it certainly doesn’t look like that stuff,” he says, pointing to the seaweed. despite himself, jeongguk giggles at the haughty expression on yoongi’s face. he didn’t think about that—how life on a different planet can differ down to the kind of food they eat, not just the technology they have or their government systems. he figured that since yoongi and the other contraxians look much like humans, that everything else would be similar about them. but once again, he’s been proven wrong.
“earth is very strange,” yoongi adds like an afterthought. “it looks different from home. you look different from home.”
“you’re the one who has two different colours of skin.”
“that’s normal for me,” shrugs yoongi. jeongguk doesn’t tell him it looks pretty, especially the hair—not after he told yoongi that his chosen name was pretty. he doesn’t think he needs to embarrass himself with that again. “your hero thing is weird, too. where do superpowers even come from?”
jeongguk shrugs, shoving another piece of seaweed in his mouth. “i got bitten by a spider,” he says. “and then i gained all these spider powers, so i made web fluid and shooters and everything to use. seokjin-hyung—mr. kim, i guess—he doesn’t actually have powers. it’s all just technology and money and his big, fat brain. and his big, fat ego. that’s how he’s iron man.” he grins. he can’t help ribbing seokjin once in a while, but he really is the greatest super hero in the world, as far as jeongguk is concerned. “some of the other avengers—that’s what our group of superheroes on earth are called, by the way, isn’t it sweet—have actual powers, some don’t. jimin-hyung—or black widow, i guess, was trained to be an assassin, i think. he’s just really scary and flexible and good at fighting people. namjoon-hyung, he turns into this big green monster when he’s angry or something like that. that was some serum thing. i don’t really know. he doesn’t like being the hulk, though, that’s all i know. he’s pretty cool otherwise.”
he hits his heels against the building, offering the seaweed to yoongi again. this time, he wordlessly takes a piece. “oh, and there’s hobi. he’s the god of thunder, so he’s from another planet like you, but like—he’s supposed to be the ruler of that planet, i think? he’s not here a lot, obviously. but he’s super strong and everything. i think you’d like him.” jeongguk hasn’t spent a lot of time with hoseok, but the way hoseok tries to understand earth things reminds him a bit of yoongi already. “and taehyungie-hyung, he’s captain america. obviously he’s from america, but when shit happens over here, he comes to help. he was frozen in the ground for like, seventy years! and he’s just strong and all that. and he has a nice butt, but that’s neither here nor there.”
jeongguk shrugs, munching on another piece of seaweed. he’s not an overly talkative person, but the moment someone mention the avengers, he’s all too happy to gush about them. “they’re all part of the original avengers, you know?” he asks. “like, when they decided earth needed people to defend it, they were the first ones. and then seokjin-hyung asked me to help with some stuff, so i did, and now they just kind of defend earth every time someone tries to attack. i guess i’m an avenger, but for the most part, i just want to be the friendly neighbourhood spider-man, you know? i help out the avengers when they really need it, and seokjin-hyung gets me to do some stuff with him like this. but i like fighting crime right here in seoul, helping people if they need it, doing good right here. obviously i don’t want aliens to attack earth, but i think we have enough problems with humans for me to try and fight.”
he looks up at yoongi again, finally, only to find yoongi looking at him with a horribly endeared expression on his face. “sorry,” says jeongguk quickly. “that was a lot. you probably don’t care.”
“i do care,” says yoongi. “i find it fascinating. you really like the avengers, huh?”
“they’re all older than me,” says jeongguk. “and i always wanted to be a part of them when i first became spider-man. and it was seokjin-hyung who made that a reality for me—and gave me this cool suit and gave me the chance to be more—so i really owe him everything. i love him a lot.” he can’t always say that to seokjin without the risk of getting a butt whooping for being gross and mushy, but it’s the truth.
yoongi hums. “sounds cool,” he says. “we don’t have anything like that on contraxia. not that we really have invasions, so it’s not like we need it, i guess. i do a lot of traveling to other planets, actually—helping with peace talks, assisting our own government in negotiations.”
“playing hide and seek.”
“playing hide and seek,” yoongi nods, grinning. “being a bug boy is more interesting than not.”
“yoongi,” sighs jeongguk. “it’s spider-man.”
“i know,” laughs yoongi, knocking his foot against jeongguk’s. “i just like seeing how exasperated you get when i say it wrong.”
jeongguk frowns, rubbing at his cheeks to hide the slight blush. “but yes, being spider-man is pretty cool,” he says. “i get to swing around the city, can use my webbing for just about everything, can walk anywhere. honestly, fighting crime and helping people is fun, but i also like not having to walk across the room to grab my phone if i don’t want to.”
“aren’t superheroes supposed to be proactive and not lazy?”
“that’s not being lazy! you can’t tell me that you wouldn’t use webbing for that kind of stuff.”
“we have technology on contraxia do move stuff for us, so i don’t need webbing.”
“and you call me lazy.”
“i’m not the superhero.”
jeongguk gives him a gentle shove and yoongi pretends to starts slipping off of the building, making jeongguk grab him and haul him back to his side as fear spikes through him. and yoongi laughs wildly, proud of himself for the joke. and that’s how it goes—they share the seaweed and then some of the other snacks that jeongguk packed, sharing easy conversation as the sun sets, the sky lit up in brilliant colours, and the dark begins to set in. yoongi asks him questions about what he does as spider-man, and jeongguk offers to show him some of the parts of his suit. he asks about earth. jeongguk asks about contraxia, learning bit by bit how it’s different from earth and what yoongi is like.
before either of them realizes it, their stake-out has slipped into hours. for the second time that day, jeongguk loses track of time and only remembers what they’re meant to be doing when he hears his phone ringing in his backpack.
“jeon jeongguk,” says seokjin when jeongguk picks up, and jeongguk can already feel the scolding. “what are you doing?”
“we’re searching for the contraxians,” says jeongguk, which isn’t a lie.
“you’re supposed to be searching in a wide area,” says seokjin. “we gave you the map so you would know what to cover!”
“yeah, we have been doing that.”
“then why are you still sitting in the same spot you were three hours ago?”
jeongguk winces. fucking tracker. before he can defend himself, however, seokjin adds, “you better not be flirting with yoongi. you’re on the job now, jeongguk-ah. i don’t care if you think he’s cute. he’s here to find his people and leave.”
“oh my god, hyung,” grumbles jeongguk. he glances over at yoongi, who has thankfully gone back to the tracking device in the middle of the roof, but jeongguk lowers his voice, cupping his hand over the end of the phone anyway when he says, “i’m not flirting. we just lost track of time.”
“because you were busy telling him all of your cool spider-man stories.”
“no,” protests jeongguk, even though that’s kind of exactly what he was doing. “look, we’ll keep going right now. i’m sorry that we lost track of time. please don’t take away my suit, hyung, it’s genuinely my only joy in life right after every time you call me because you know i love hearing your voice.”
“you’re insufferable, jeon jeongguk,” sighs seokjin. “and you’re glad i like you so much. it’s too late to keep going now, though. you have school tomorrow.”
jeongguk huffs. “i don’t need to go to school if i’m doing avengers stuff.”
“this isn’t avengers stuff,” says seokjin. “this is you trying to fuck an alien. bring him back to kim tower and you can come back tomorrow after classes to keep going if we haven’t already found them by then.”
he can’t even sputter out that he’s not trying to fuck an alien before seokjin hangs up. the truth is that he really has enjoyed the last few hours of just talking to yoongi. it turns out he’s funny and smart and a great listener, and he’s eager to learn about earth even though he calls it a strange and backwards place. and jeongguk does like him. as a friend, obviously. he can have a friend he happens to think is very pretty.
“yoongi,” he calls once he’s recovered from the phone call, swinging his legs back over the ledge and hopping down onto the roof. “we have to go back.” it’s almost impressive how quickly yoongi manages to power down the device he was using and get to jeongguk’s side, pressed against him with that same fond grin he’s been wearing the whole time. jeongguk blames it on his eagerness to swing around the city, since he wouldn’t stop talking about how fun it was the first time.
and if he takes a few detours along the way just to stay close to yoongi a little longer, just to hear him laughing as they fly between buildings and over traffic, no one really needs to know.
back at kim tower, knowing he has to get home and sleep before classes tomorrow, jeongguk just grins at yoongi. “good luck tomorrow,” he says. “don’t find them without me.” it’s teasing, of course, but he realizes how much he wants that to be true; of course he wants to find the contraxians, since that’s what yoongi and the rest of the delegation are here for, but he doesn’t want them to find them before jeongguk can come back and spend more time with yoongi. the idea of yoongi going home and never coming back after just a few hours is strangely disappointing.
yoongi just grins at him, and seokjin physically drags jeongguk away before they can say anything else, pushing him into the elevator and telling him to go to bed with that warning look jeongguk is so familiar with.
whether or not because jeongguk willed it, they don’t find the contraxians the next day, or the day after, or the day after that. it takes almost a full week for them to finally pinpoint the location and swoop in to bring the contraxians back home—and jeongguk doesn’t get to head over to kim tower every day, but he tries as much as he can. he and yoongi are always paired together, always swinging around the city and talking and laughing. all it takes is those few meetings for jeongguk to become entirely smitten, and the news that the contraxians have finally been found is met with a roiling dread in his stomach. contraxia is in an entirely different galaxy from earth, and while it won’t take long for them to travel with their technology, that doesn’t mean yoongi will ever come back.
so it’s completely surprising and entirely welcome when their last meeting in kim tower to send the delegation off is met with yoongi announcing, “i’d like to stay.”
everyone stares at him. “pardon?” asks one of the other contraxians.
“i like earth,” says yoongi with a shrug. “i’d like to stay for a little bit. my life has become dry on contraxia, admittedly, and although my work there is important, i think that it would be useful to have someone stationed here on earth. clearly this planet is someplace that our people know and are willing to travel to, so what if something like this happens again? and our fellow contraxians may have left something here that i could watch for.” admittedly, it does sound thought out and logical, although something tells jeongguk that yoongi is doing it less for the logic and more for the desire.
over the past few days, he has seemed very fascinated with everything about earth that jeongguk has mentioned, wanting to learn as much about the climate and government and pop culture. they haven’t had a chance to do anything around seoul because of their mission, but if yoongi is staying, then—
“are you sure?” asks the other contraxian. “you have a life at home. do you want to give that up for earth?”
yoongi looks at jeongguk for a brief second, but it’s one that jeongguk sees well. “i’m sure,” he confirms. “i’ll come back, of course. but i think it’s right that i stay here for now.”
no one argues with him—he’s a grown adult, after all—and jeongguk tries to contain the new excitement that fills him at the idea of yoongi staying. he doesn’t know anyone on earth, though, and certainly has no place to stay, so as soon as they send the contraxians off—leaving a small ship for yoongi in the event that he wants to go home—jeongguk grabs his wrist.
“you can come home with me,” he says with a beaming smile. “i live in a dorm and technically that’s not allowed, but just for now until you can find your own place if you intend on staying that long. and i can take you shopping! and we can go eat all of that food i was telling you about.”
it’s seokjin who responds, calling out his name. jeongguk turns to look at him, confused when he sees the hard look on seokjin’s face. despite his scolding of jeongguk, he really does care about him, looking out for him as best as he can. and he probably doesn’t think it’s the best idea to let a total stranger into his room like that, but jeongguk can’t help being eager and trusting.
he gives seokjin a look that he hopes says, i’m an adult.
seokjin gives him a look back, one that clearly says, you’re still a fucking idiot.
jeongguk tightens his hold on yoongi’s wrist. “i’ll help you,” he adds, although he’s still looking at seokjin. “that’s what a friendly neighbourhood spider-man should do.”
the staring contest is only broken by yoongi leaning over and kissing jeongguk’s cheek, which has jeongguk rapidly turning around to stare at yoongi’s grin. his cheeks heat immediately, surprised by the sudden show of affection. “i would really like that,” says yoongi. “if i decide to stay for a long time, i’m sure i can find somewhere to live. but i’ll take whatever help you want to give, bug boy.”
“spider—”
“spider-man, yeah, yeah,” laughs yoongi, turning his hand and slip his wrist out of jeongguk’s grip and tangle their fingers together instead. he tugs jeongguk toward the elevator, turning over his shoulder to wave at seokjin. “thanks for the help again, mr. kim! jeongguk, can we web swing home or are you going to make me ride in those godawful cars?”
“i-i mean, whatever you want, i guess—” begins jeongguk, glancing over at seokjin as well. he still has that dark look on his face, clearly not approving, but for once, jeongguk wants to do something for himself. he’s been listening to seokjin for years and is grateful for everything seokjin has done, but seokjin is always telling him that he needs to branch out a little. so this is jeongguk branching out.
yoongi is kind and fun and—good. he’s good. and when they swing back to jeongguk’s dorm, yoongi yelling with joy the whole time, jeongguk feels like he’s good, too.
✴ ✴ ✴
they move yoongi into jeongguk’s dorm the next day. it’s not really allowed, but maybe jeongguk has let the administration at his school know about his secret identity and they now let him get away with just about anything knowing they have one of the avengers going to their school and living in one of their buildings. it’s not like yoongi has anything to bring with him anyway, considering he’s from a different planet.
so they go shopping. jeongguk drags yoongi to countless clothing stores until they find a handful of outfits that he actually likes, and find him decorations and other necessities that will help him survive—and blend in on earth. he’s hardly the first alien to live on earth, but humans have a hard enough time accepting each other, let alone a different species entirely.
it helps that yoongi is fascinated with anything human. he wants to stop in at every store in the mall they go to, wants to try every food they come across, wants to talk to every person just to learn more. he wants to dress like every person they see, learn about their (inferior) technology. he’s fascinated with jeongguk’s cell phone, laughing when he explains how different things are on earth and how advanced contraxia is in comparison.
when they pass a barber shop, yoongi pauses as he always does, peering into the window and tugging at the long braid he’s done in his hair today; jeongguk has gotten distracted walking behind him a few times, just following the trails of blonde and red hair that have been woven together.
yoongi turns to jeongguk, then, reaching up and tugging at jeongguk’s dark hair. “men wear their hair short here,” he states. “i should cut mine.”
“no!” says jeongguk immediately, horror filling him.
yoongi pauses, staring. “no?”
“no,” repeats jeongguk. “i mean—lots of men wear their hair long here. and lots of women wear their hair short. some people might think that’s weird, but i’m of the firm belief that hair shouldn’t be gendered. so you should keep it long.” yoongi’s hair has quickly become one of jeongguk’s favourite parts of his appearance. “i mean, only if you want to, though. you can do what you want. sorry.”
even as he feels almost ashamed of trying to push yoongi one way or another, a soft grin worms its way onto yoongi’s face. he tugs at jeongguk’s bangs again. “okay, i’ll keep it this way,” he says. “maybe you should grow your hair out. i bet it would look pretty.”
jeongguk tries not to blush. “i don’t think it would work with my mask,” he admits. “where would all the hair go?”
“your suit can track people for thousands of miles and has a kill mode, but you don’t think it could deal with a little hair?”
“maybe i’ll dye my hair two colours like yours.”
yoongi’s grin brightens. “maybe i don’t need to look more like a human. maybe you just need to look more like a contraxian.”
jeongguk does his best to teach yoongi about earth. it turns out there’s a lot that he doesn’t really know—like how the government actually works or about climate change or where garbage goes after the garbage trucks take it. he can teach yoongi about the avengers, though, and about pop culture. they spend the first night in their new shared dorm watching as much anime as jeongguk can possibly convince yoongi to sit through, excitedly pointing out all of his favourite characters and rapidly explaining back stories that should aid in understanding the episodes. (he’s not sure yoongi spends a single moment actually watching the laptop. every time jeongguk looks at him, yoongi is just looking back, lips pulled back into a soft grin and eyes bright.)
on the weekend, jeongguk takes yoongi to all of the best tourist attractions in seoul. they go to a handful of palaces and temples, parks and museums, seoul tower and gwangjang market and bukchon hanok village. despite having lived in seoul for years, jeongguk hasn’t even been to most of those places, and after a whole day of bustling around with tourists, yoongi finally pulls him aside and says, “this is supposed to impress me?”
“you don’t like it?” asks jeongguk, almost crestfallen. “people come from all over the world to see this stuff.”
“i don’t know,” says yoongi. “i think i like just hanging out with you more. all of this is cool, but i like you more than temples or grass or whatever.”
what jeongguk has learned is that contraxians are often blunt—or maybe that’s just yoongi. he says just what he’s thinking or feeling without being embarrassed about it. sometimes he’s glad for it, like when yoongi admits he doesn’t want to be somewhere and it gives jeongguk an excuse to admit it, too, having been too shy to do it on his own. sometimes it makes him blush, makes him shy, too, like when yoongi admits he likes jeongguk.
but jeongguk likes yoongi too—that’s why they’re living together, why jeongguk is working so hard to help yoongi adapt to earth. it simply turns out that yoongi likes learning about the little things, like what kind of soda they have here, instead of the big things. for that, jeongguk is grateful. he was never one to like traveling to tourist spots, anyway.
they go for lamb skewers instead, because it’s the closest thing to eat. after devouring his fourth skewer, yoongi grins at him with a mouth full of meat. “this is really good,” he says. “we should have this more often.”
“it’s kind of expensive,” admits jeongguk, “and i don’t exactly get paid for being spider-man.”
“really?” asks yoongi. they’re far enough away from other people in the restaurant that they don’t have to worry about being overheard, but jeongguk still glances both ways. “i would have thought people would love superheroes enough to throw money at you.”
“it’s not that easy,” laughs jeongguk. “for one thing, there are plenty of people who hate us. who feel like we do more damage than anything—which, honestly, i have to agree with sometimes. some of us are employed with an agency or whatever, but i didn’t want to do that. i just fight petty crime and try to do what i can. and no one wants to pay for that.”
yoongi seems appalled by that information, finally paying attention to jeongguk rather than the food. “but you’re saving people,” he says, “and making the world a better place. you deserve compensation for that.”
“i don’t really want it, though. i would honestly feel bad taking someone’s money just for doing what i think is right. and yeah, there are police officers who do get paid to do what i do, but i’m just… i’m just a kid, really. i happened to get bitten by a radioactive spider who gave me cool abilities, and i’ve managed to become the mentee of the world’s coolest superhero, who gave me a leg up.” jeongguk shrugs. “just knowing i’m making a difference is enough compensation for me.”
leaning back in his chair, yoongi crosses his arms and grins at him. his hair is a bit of a mess today, half up in a bun and half down, cascading over his shoulders. jeongguk still hasn’t gotten used to the fact that half of him is red. “you’re something else, jeon jeongguk,” says yoongi. “most people would demand money and fame for this kind of work.”
“i’m not most people, am i?”
yoongi grins. “no, you’re not.”
“i don’t even have a public identity as spider-man,” says jeongguk. “only the people closest to me and the other avengers know who i really am. i don’t want the fame or anything. i just want to help.”
“you’re a good kid, bug boy,” says yoongi, and giggles as jeongguk throws a napkin at him, once again protesting the nickname.
that’s what yoongi likes, though—not just the intricate details of earth and human life, but the intricate details of jeongguk. he asks countless questions about jeongguk’s family (from busan; yes, they know he’s spider-man; no, they aren’t fond of him fighting as part of the avengers) and his schooling (majoring in chemistry; his grades haven’t suffered that much as spider-man; he knows for a fact most of his classmates either hate or love spider-man and he can’t say anything about it) and what his other interests are (anime, talking about iron man, music). yoongi claims that if he studies one human very closely, he’ll gain a better understanding of humanity in general than if he learns about many humans from afar. jeongguk thinks yoongi just has a weird obsession with him.
he certainly has a weird obsession with spider-man. every time jeongguk hears about an incident and has to leave to help deal with it, or every time they’re walking around and he sees something happen and feels the need to interfere, yoongi gets even more excited than jeongguk does and insists on coming along.
the first time, when they’re sitting in the dorm room and jeongguk gets an alert on his phone about an ongoing robbery only a few blocks away, yoongi immediately jumps up and puts on his new coat as jeongguk is rapidly changing into his spider-man suit.
at the window, with yoongi looking eager as ever, jeongguk pauses. “what are you doing?” he asks.
“i’m coming with you,” says yoongi.
“yoongi, you can’t do that.”
“why not?”
“because it’s dangerous!”
“then why can you go?”
“because i’m spider-man,” says jeongguk, huffing. “you’re just going to get in the way. what if you get hurt or something?”
“i can help,” protests yoongi. “i don’t want to go in. i can like… direct people outside. or the police. or something.”
jeongguk just stares at him. the safest and best thing to do is leave yoongi here, but yoongi doesn’t seem as though he’s going to back down any time soon, and each second that they stand here arguing is another second in which the robbers could get away—or worse, hurt someone in the meantime.
so jeongguk groans, shoving the window open and crawling out before he sticks his arm back in and gestures for yoongi to join him. “fine,” he says. “but if you so much as get a scratch on your stupid alien ass, i’ll lock you in my dorm for a week.”
yoongi practically squeals, latching himself onto jeongguk’s side before jeongguk leaps into the air, keeping one arm secure around yoongi and the other shooting a web to the nearest building.
he hopes it’ll be a one-time occurrence, but he’s not so lucky. yoongi starts looking for excuses for jeongguk to turn into spider-man, as he calls it, just so he can get in on the action. sometimes yoongi can help, like when jeongguk is just helping elderly people across the street or getting cats out of trees. when it’s anything remotely dangerous, jeongguk concedes by letting yoongi come with him but makes him stay far enough away that he won’t get hurt. of course, yoongi always looks a little worried about him and makes sure to look him over several times to check if he’s been injured as soon as they return home.
jeongguk does get injured, although it’s never anything serious. after catching a teenager trying to beat up a younger kid not far from the dorm while returning from classes—meaning yoongi isn’t with him—jeongguk pulls on his mask and tries to cool things down. it goes well, at least until the teenager throws the empty bottle he was holding at jeongguk when jeongguk is too distracted with the younger kid to pick up on it, succeeding at hitting him in the head. jeongguk curses, but the teenager runs off before jeongguk can do anything about it, and despite pain blossoming on his forehead, he makes sure the kid is fine before he finally returns to his dorm.
yoongi is watching anime when he gets there—he’s gotten booked on boku no hero academia, probably because of the superpower things, and also because he kind of looks strikingly like todoroki—and at first, he doesn’t even look up. jeongguk has pulled his hood over his head to hide what he imagines is a massive bruise that has already begun to form, not having his mask to hide it. jeongguk is glad for the distraction, turning his back to yoongi as he puts away his school supplies.
it only lasts for so long.
“you had to go spidey?” asks yoongi, and jeongguk flinches.
“what makes you say that?” he asks, not turning around to face him.
“your mask is hanging out of your bag.”
jeongguk closes his eyes, mentally cursing himself for not being more careful. to be fair, he immediately got such a pounding headache that he couldn’t be fucked to be more careful, but it’s already biting him in the ass. so he just clears his throat, stuffing the mask further into his bag. “yeah,” he says. “i just saw some kid bullying someone else, so i stopped it.”
“why are you talking to the wall?”
“i’m talking to you.”
“jeongguk.”
“yoongi.”
he hears yoongi sigh. he probably already knows—usually jeongguk is excited to rehash his spider-man adventures when yoongi isn’t around. he’s been detailing every moment of his superhero life for the past five years, always happy to tell someone new about all of the cool things he’s done, especially with the avengers and seokjin. the fact that he hasn’t already begun a play-by-play of the encounter with the kids is testament enough that something is wrong.
sure enough, yoongi asks, voice low, “did you get hurt?”
“no,” says jeongguk immediately, too quickly. his hand rises to just above his right eyebrow, where the bottle connected. he winces at the pain he feels there, the skin raised and sore. “i’m spider-man. i can’t get hurt by some kids.”
“spider-man got hurt by a razor yesterday.”
“you snuck up on me while i was shaving,” protests jeongguk. “that wasn’t my fault.”
“jeongguk,” tries yoongi again. “please show me.”
over the past few weeks that they’ve known enough other, yoongi has been nothing but caring and enthusiastic and—good. still, jeongguk hesitates. still, he finds it hard to let anyone see him vulnerable, especially when it comes to being spider-man. but he knows yoongi will wait for as long as it takes. so jeongguk closes his eyes again, breathing through his teeth, and then turns around.
yoongi is watching him carefully, the laptop closed beside him on the bed. “can you pull down your hood, please?”
jeongguk purses his lips. and then he does as yoongi asked, sliding the hood back to his shoulders. immediately, yoongi gasps, rushing toward him with his hands already moving to cradle jeongguk’s face. and jeongguk frowns, pulling away just a little even as yoongi tilts his head, gently wiping his hair away from the wound. it’s not much, not nearly the worst injury he has sustained in the midst of being spider-man. but it does hurt. and it’s still the worst injury of his that yoongi has seen.
“what happened?” yoongi demands. “do you have something to heal this? i don’t know about human medicine—god, why didn’t i bring a first-aid kid? we have patches that could heal this in an instant.”
“it’s not that bad,” protests jeongguk, trying to pull yoongi’s hands away from him. “it doesn’t even hurt.”
“it’s the size of a bruviek egg.”
“a what?”
“jeongguk,” sighs yoongi, hand on jeongguk’s chin turning his face so they can make eye contact. there’s something stern and fierce in his eyes—the first time jeongguk has seen him like that. so often, yoongi is only soft and excited and open. it occurs to him that he has no idea what contraxians are like when they’re angry.
“the kid hit me in the head with a glass bottle,” jeongguk admits quietly. “he just threw it at me when i was trying to help and ran away. like i said, nothing.” he finally succeeds in pulling yoongi’s hands away from him, tugging his hood back on as he moves to sit on his bed. he averts yoongi’s gaze, but—yoongi follows. yoongi always follows.
kneeling in front of jeongguk, yoongi touches his knee. “why are you so closed off about this? i’m just trying to help you. do you not want me to be concerned?”
jeongguk frowns. “it’s just—embarrassing.”
“what is?”
“i’m spider-man,” says jeongguk. “i’m a superhero. i can stick to walls and i made my own web shooters and i’ve fought some of the worst things to come to earth, and i got hurt by a fucking bottle that some kid threw. that’s not supposed to happen.”
“jeongguk,” says yoongi. he reaches for jeongguk’s hand, and jeongguk lets him take it. “that’s nothing to be embarrassed about. superheroes get hurt, too.”
“yeah, from like stab wounds and alien technology and fighting bad people. not a little kid with really good aim.”
yoongi—snorts. jeongguk’s head snaps up, glaring at him as yoongi lets out another giggle, holding a hand to his mouth. “yoongi,” he says. “it’s not funny!”
“it’s a little funny.”
“aren’t you supposed to be making me feel better?”
“you’re a baby, jeongguk,” laughs yoongi, reaching up to smooth down his hair—on the uninjured side. “sometimes people just get hurt for really stupid reasons. and you did stop that kid from bullying someone, right?”
jeongguk shifts, pouting. “i guess.”
“so you did what you wanted to do,” says yoongi. “you told me that you just want to do what’s right and help people. and that’s what you did. would you rather the other kid get hurt by that bottle?”
“no,” mumbles jeongguk. he leans a little into yoongi’s hand, hating that yoongi is being logical about this and winning. “but it’s still embarrassing! i’m supposed to be cool.”
“okay, so it’s embarrassing,” says yoongi. “but no one has to know. and you can be cool and a baby at the same time.”
“are you making fun of me?”
“do you have medicine to make this better?”
“i think i have something in my closet,” says jeongguk, finally conceding that it would nice to take a pain killer or something. he sighs, leaning back until he’s lying on the bed. “god, it really hurts. i have such a headache.”
“poor baby,” sighs yoongi, and before jeongguk can scold him for it, yoongi leans over him and presses the softest of kisses to the injury. “better?”
jeongguk’s face turns positively red, glad for the fact that only his lamp is on so that it’s harder to see. still, he flings a foot out, connecting with yoongi’s thigh. “does contraxian spit have healing powers?”
“not that i know of,” frowns yoongi. “but maybe it’s different on humans. i better kiss you again, just to be sure.” and then he does just that, so blunt, kissing the stupid little bump on jeongguk’s forehead, and then again in between his eyebrows, and then once more on the tip of his nose. jeongguk can’t stop blushing, even after yoongi grabs the medicine from the closet and gives him a few pills and then tells him to shove over so he can crawl in and they can finish watching the episode he was on when jeongguk arrived.
jeongguk watches the characters talk about feelings and wishes it were so easy.
✴ ✴ ✴
“do you do this a lot?”
jeongguk lifts his head up to look at yoongi, who is sitting on the ledge of the building beside jeongguk’s legs. and jeongguk considers the question; he’s hanging upside down off of the edge of the building, knees hooked over the ledge. he doesn’t have to worry about falling, because he’s entirely stuck to the building, but he could understand any apprehensions yoongi might have.
“do this specifically?” he asks.
“i mean coming up to tall buildings like this and just… sitting. thinking. enjoying the view.”
jeongguk shrugs. “sometimes, yeah.” he lets his head hang again, looking at the cityscape upside down. seoul is so much different from up here, or when he’s swinging from building to building. he gets to see things no one else does, even if it gets lonely sometimes.
“it’s a good place to clear your head, i imagine,” says yoongi.
with a sigh, jeongguk puts his hands down beside him and rolls backwards off of the building until he does a full roll over his shoulder and puts his feet back on the side of the building. he stands up from there, now sticking ninety degrees out of the building and staring up at the sky.
after a second, yoongi says, “you’re very strange.”
“i try to get seokjin-hyung to do this with me sometimes,” says jeongguk, sticking his hands in his coat pockets and beginning to pace on the side of the building under yoongi’s feet, occasionally kicking them as he passes. “he doesn’t have time, though.”
“no time for you? i thought you were important to him.”
“i am. but he’s—i mean, he’s iron man. and he’s the head of kim industries so he has a lot on his plate. and i get it. when you’re that important, it’s hard to find time to hang out on top of a building with a kid.” jeongguk sighs, stopping beside yoongi’s feet and squatting down. he runs his finger over the edge of yoongi’s shoes—jeongguk’s shoes, a little big for his feet, but he liked them. scuffed up converse, ones that jeongguk has drawn all over. the sharpie ink is smudged now.
yoongi leans over just enough to run a finger through jeongguk’s bangs. “do you get upset about it?” he asks. “not getting to be part of the avengers like iron man and cap and black widow do?”
“i chose this,” says jeongguk. “i don’t want to always be doing what they do. you know, i like having my own life while also being spider-man, but—i dunno. i guess sometimes i feel a little left out.” he finally looks up at yoongi, unable to help the pout on his lips. he doesn’t have many people he can talk to about this, considering not many people know he’s spider-man. and the ones who do know are the ones he’s trying to complain about, so it’s not so easy. suddenly, he realizes just how much he likes having yoongi around—who knows him and likes him for him, who has had no real understanding of who spider-man is before all of this. there are no expectations, no disappointments. and he’s a good listener.
“could you talk to him about it?” asks yoongi. “about giving you more opportunities to feel included?”
“he doesn’t like me being included that much,” pouts jeongguk. “he wants to keep me safe and everything. which is fair, but he’s only five years older than me! and i’ve proven myself plenty of times.” he huffs, finally crawling the rest of the way up to the edge of the building and sitting on the end, right side up beside yoongi. “i know i said i like being able to help with little things, but sometimes i want to be part of the bigger stuff, too.”
“i get it,” says yoongi, taking jeongguk’s hand. he runs his fingers over jeongguk’s knuckles, the back of his hand, turning his palm over. “i’m not a superhero or anything back on contraxia, but i do work with the government agencies that specialize in defense of our planet. just in transport, sure, but it’s still important stuff. most of the time, i’m just carting officials around to other planets, but any time there’s a real crisis, i’m never the one to help. and i want to—to do more, you know? to make a real difference.”
jeongguk watches him, eyebrows pinched. he realizes that he’s been talking so much about himself since they met that he hasn’t learned a lot about yoongi. yoongi has explained plenty of things about contraxia, but jeongguk is always gushing about iron man and the avengers or recounting his own spider-man adventures that yoongi has had no time to talk about his own feelings.
“oh,” says jeongguk. “i’m sorry, yoongi. that’s not fair.”
“it’s not really that,” shrugs yoongi. “it’s not like they can send me into war when i don’t have the training, but i’ve been flying ships for as long as i can remember and i’ve studied as much as i can and i know things. i make sure i know things. but i rarely get the chance to show that.”
frowning, jeongguk threads their fingers together and squeezes. “you can show it to me,” he says. “i know it’s not the same, but i’m always happy to listen to all of the stuff you know.”
yoongi grins at him, one of those soft and special ones that jeongguk loves to see. and then yoongi leans over and rests his head on jeongguk’s shoulder, and jeongguk looks out at the darkening skyline of seoul as yoongi starts talking—about the different kind of ships and how operating them is different and about the way the military works on contraxia and about all of the different languages he knows and how that can be useful and about other things, too—other planets and things called infinity stones, which rings a bell for jeongguk, something long forgotten in a battle with the avengers before he was even spider-man, and the technology they used to find the hiding contraxians. it’s gotten colder, but jeongguk feels warm up here, with yoongi snuggled into his side.
he does do this a lot. but never like this—never when he’s not felt lonely, never when he’s finally felt as though it’s worth it. he does do this a lot—but he likes this time the very best, all because of an alien named min yoongi.
✴ ✴ ✴
“you know, this suit has like, a million different web settings,” says jeongguk.
“a million,” deadpans yoongi. “why do i find that hard to believe?”
“i’m not lying! i haven’t even tried all of them out and it’s been years.” they’re hanging out in a park near the university, jeongguk donning his spider suit—because he thinks it’s important to do exercises and training in his suit to ensure that he stays limber and fit, and so that he doesn’t forget how to use some of the suit settings that he hasn’t had to for a while. it can be dangerous just walking around in his spider suit, but they’ve chosen a spot near the middle of the park with less people and loads of trees to stay somewhat hidden.
jeongguk gets up from the ground where he was doing leg stretches, turning to look at yoongi instead—who is lounging on a web hammock that jeongguk made between two of the trees. yoongi had teased him about his webbing settings, something about how fancy his suit looked but how jeongguk only really swung them around the city rather than doing anything useful, and jeongguk couldn’t let him slander the suit seokjin made for him like that.
so he made a hammock.
“most of them are combat centered, so i’m not going to use them on you,” jeongguk argues when yoongi looks unimpressed. “like—like there’s one that has an explosive on it, so the web will explode. and there’s one that has a stunner on it, and one that has a tracker in it so i can track people or whatever.”
“sounds an awful lot like that suit is meant for war,” muses yoongi.
jeongguk looks down at the suit with a shrug. “it kind of was,” he admits. “and it’s helpful when i’m dealing with scary stuff. and also for like, being lazy.”
“or making hammocks?”
jeongguk flicks his wrist at yoongi, watching a tiny ball of webbing shoot out at him. surprisingly, yoongi manages to dodge it, ducking his head so the web attaches to the hammock behind him. he turns a dangerous look at jeongguk. “were you going to hit me with that?”
“it was an accident,” says jeongguk. “sometimes i can’t control it…”
yoongi is off of the hammock in a second, lunging across the grass for him, and jeongguk laughs, shooting a web toward the nearest tree branch and dragging himself up before yoongi can reach him. he lands in a crouch on the branch, looking down at yoongi staring back up at him. the truth is that things have been a lot more fun in the past few months that they’ve gotten to know each other. being spider-man has always been one of jeongguk’s favourite things, whether because he’s a superhero or because he gets to help people or because he gets to work with one of his own heroes.
but for some time, jeongguk has begun to lose the joy in it. there has been something missing, something that he couldn’t put his finger on. now, as he laughs again and then attaches another web to the branch and slowly tips over until he can lower himself down, upside down and at yoongi’s level so their faces meet a little backwards, he can’t say that yoongi was missing. but yoongi has begun to help him find the joy of being spider-man again, of doing what he does, of having these abilities and this suit.
sometimes it’s not even about being able to fight in a war, having faced alien enemies, being a minor celebrity. sometimes it’s about the little things, too—being able to make yoongi laugh as he hangs upside down from the branch by a web, a bit like a real spider. or being able to talk to someone about the hard parts of it, knowing that yoongi can’t quite understand but will do his best to listen, anyway.
yoongi was supposed to move out of jeongguk’s dorm within a few weeks. now it’s been three months and he’s still here, and jeongguk doesn’t want him to leave. he likes what they have, even if it had strange beginnings—because yoongi makes him feel like he can be a superhero as jeon jeongguk, too. yoongi makes him feel like he doesn’t have to be spider-man to be cool or deserve love or make a difference. he’s just as good as a regular twenty-one-year-old who doesn’t understand taxes and cries when pets die in movies.
at eye level now, yoongi just shakes his head at jeongguk. there’s that little grin on his lips, though, the one that jeongguk is so used to seeing when yoongi is exasperated with him—which happens often. they spend so much of their time laughing together, teasing each other, learning about each other in all of the soft ways. by now, jeongguk is used to the spiders that travel his spine every time yoongi smiles at him.
“doesn’t all the blood rush to your head when you do that?” asks yoongi, tapping jeongguk’s masked cheek.
“yeah,” admits jeongguk. “but i’m a spider. this is what spiders do.”
“what if you had been bitten by a different insect? imagine if you were beetle-man or something instead.”
“that’s not nearly as cool. seokjin-hyung would have never let me be part of the avengers.”
yoongi snorts, cradling jeongguk’s head in his hands now. his eyesight is beginning to go spotty from being upside down, but he focuses on yoongi, on the half-and-half of him. maybe his personality is a bit like that too—he’s soft, always, but not afraid to be firm with jeongguk when he needs it. he’s blunt and bold at times, but can become shy and flustered by something he doesn’t understand or something jeongguk says to tease him. and yet he’s all beauty, all caring, all kind and wonder and so much more than any human jeongguk has ever met.
“i still would have liked you,” says yoongi quietly. “no matter what kind of bug boy you are.”
“what if i wasn’t a bug boy at all?” asks jeongguk. “what if i was just me and i couldn’t stick to walls or didn’t have superhuman abilities and senses and couldn’t do like, forty back flips without getting dizzy?”
“jeongguk,” sighs yoongi, and then he leans forward, pressing his lips to jeongguk’s forehead through the mask. he keeps moving up by moving down jeongguk’s face—pressing a kiss to the bridge of his nose, and then the tip of it, and then his cupid’s bow. jeongguk holds his breath, head pounding with both the rush of blood and something more, staring at yoongi’s throat as yoongi presses his lips to jeongguk’s through the mask—it’s through the mask, it doesn’t count, it can’t, it shouldn’t—there’s but a thin layer of material between them, thin enough that jeongguk can feel everything: the pressure and heat of yoongi’s lips against his, the dips and curves, mismatched because he’s the wrong side up.
suddenly, jeongguk has never hated his spider suit more.
yoongi pulls away, nothing more than a soft press of his lips. he opens his mouth to say more, jeongguk waiting with bated breath, and then—jeongguk’s head explodes.
or—that’s what it feels like. suddenly, all he sees is red, a siren blaring only inside of his head because of his suit, and jeongguk flinches so hard that he loses grip on the web holding him to the tree; he goes crashing to the ground, yoongi jumping back with a yelp of surprise, and the siren just keeps going, words flashing in the mask in front of jeongguk’s eyes. he yells, pressing his hands to his ears to try and drown it out even though he can’t, and he finally looks at the words flashing before his eyes in red—EMERGENCY.
jeongguk breathes hard, pushing himself up from the ground. “what?” he yells at his own suit. “what’s going on?”
from within his mask, he hears the calm voice of the artificial intelligence included in the suit that he has turned off unless he needs it: “jeongguk, you’re receiving an emergency distress call.”
“what? from who? what’s going on?”
“jeongguk?” he hears yoongi asking. there’s a hand on his shoulder, but jeongguk can’t see anything that isn’t red—“what’s happening?”
“who’s the distress call from?” jeongguk snaps.
“it’s from across the city. from one of the iron man armors.”
jeongguk’s heart stops for just a moment before kickstarting again, breath hitching in his throat. “which one?” he demands. “is someone in it? is it him?”
“jeongguk—”
“it wasn’t sent manually. but empty suits don’t send distress calls.”
it’s him—it’s seokjin. jeongguk suddenly sees a plethora of memories he doesn’t want—seokjin bleeding, hurt, disappointed. seokjin needing him, needing him enough to send out a distress call even though he’s always so adamant about jeongguk not needing to get involved in his messes. he wouldn’t call for help if he wasn’t desperate, if he wasn’t on the verge of—
“show me where to go!” jeongguk yells to his suit, already taking off away from the tree before he hears his name being called from outside of the suit and remembers he’s not alone.
“jeongguk, wait!” calls yoongi, and jeongguk turns around to look at him. the sea of red has disappeared from the mask, replaced by a map of the city now, pulsing red where the distress call came from, where jeongguk needs to go. through it, yoongi looks confused and worried, reaching for him. “what the fuck is going on?”
“it’s seokjin-hyung,” says jeongguk. “he needs me.”
“what happened to him?”
“i don’t know.” jeongguk’s heart is pounding loudly enough that he fears yoongi can hear it, the fear making his adrenaline spike. he has no idea what he’ll come across, but he needs to go—needs to go now. “i’m sorry, yoongi, i have to go—”
“without me?”
“you can’t come with me! it’s too dangerous.”
“i could help—”
“yoongi, no.” jeongguk takes a step back, antsy to leave now; each second is precious when he doesn’t know what’s wrong with seokjin to have sent a distress call like that. “i’m sorry, but i can’t drag you into this. just—i’ll call you, okay? go back to the apartment!” then he turns and takes off running, yoongi still calling after him but knowing that he can’t risk it, not this time.
seokjin has always been—invincible. whatever he’s facing is something that jeongguk can’t allow yoongi to get mixed up in.
it takes little time for jeongguk to get to his destination, desperation and fear spurring him onward to swing as fast as possible. he has to stop swinging at some point, no tall buildings to attach to as he moves from the business part of seoul into a residential area, and he takes off running instead, skidding down streets as the areas get increasingly less impressive. by the time he turns down the street with the pulsing dot on the map he’s been provided, he doesn’t know where he is, run-down houses offering him little solace as he searches for any signs of seokjin.
but seokjin finds him first.
jeongguk sees the familiar iron man armor fly out from behind one of the houses at the end of the street, boosters burning on his hands and feet. immediately, jeongguk patches a communication through to seokjin, slowing down as relief washes over him at seeing that he isn’t hurt—that maybe the distress call was a mistake.
“hyung!” he calls. “are you okay? what’s going on?”
there’s a strange crackling noise through the communications link, and jeongguk slows to a stop as seokjin hovers in the air above the house for a few seconds. then his head turns toward jeongguk, and jeongguk waves an arm out, trying it again: “seokjin-hyung? i got a distress call from your suit. are you okay?”
more crackling—jeongguk taps his ear a few times, thinking it might help, and he’s so busy trying to figure that out that he almost doesn’t see seokjin moving again. when he looks up, the iron man armor is so much closer and he realizes, eyes widening, that he’s flying toward jeongguk—not just flying, but racing toward him, flat to the ground, and seokjin raises an arm, holding his palm out to jeongguk like he’s going to shoot at him and—
“—gguk!” seokjin yells, finally coming through the crackling. his voice is panicked and pained. “jeongguk, run! that’s not me!”
“what?” jeongguk asks, rooted to the spot as seokjin—or the iron man armor—races for him, and his palm lights up, the tell-tale sign that he’s going to blast something at jeongguk.
“run!” seokjin yells again, and jeongguk finally dives out of the way in time for the iron man armor to send a massive blast at him. it blows a hole in the pavement, chunks spraying into the air, and jeongguk wastes no time in rolling and standing up again, running down the street toward the house that the armor flew out from. he glances over his shoulder to see the armor is following him again, faster than jeongguk can run, and holding out his fist, that fucking machine gun popping out of his arm—
“hyung, what the fuck is happening?” yells jeongguk, desperately changing courses and running in between the nearest houses just as the iron man armor opens fire. the tiny explosives blast the house instead as jeongguk leaps over the fence between the houses.
“jeongguk, go,” seokjin tells him. “you have to get out of here!”
“what is that thing?” asks jeongguk, vaulting over another fence as an explosion sends part of it flying, the iron man armor still pursuing him. he leaps into the last yard on the street and then stops short, staring as he sees not just one iron man armor but—a dozen, it seems, all identical to the first, all identical to seokjin’s armor, rising into the air in front of him. jeongguk can’t breathe, suddenly, fear gripping his heart. the entire end of the street is destroyed, pavement and concrete ripped up by explosions, and half of the house next to jeongguk has been blown apart, too.
he can only guess why.
“hyung,” jeongguk whispers, taking a small step back. the iron man armors hover in the air, watching him with glowing eyes and all of that fucking fire power in their suits. like they’re waiting for him to run so they can chase him. “what’s happening?”
“fuck, jeongguk,” seokjin groans; for the first time, jeongguk realizes it sounds as though he’s in incredible pain. “i don’t know! this is where we found those contraxians and the police were getting calls about weird shit happening and they contacted me so i came to check it out and—i don’t know, jeongguk. i don’t know if they left it on purpose, but it’s some weapon.”
jeongguk swallows tightly, taking another careful step back. these aren’t illusion or holograms—the blasts from the first iron man were real and he felt them. if all of them are going to attack him, jeongguk will have to fight. he’ll have to fight a dozen iron men.
“what kind of weapon?” jeongguk whispers.
“i don’t know, jeongguk. i’m sorry, i don’t know. i think it does something to scan you, though, and it can replicate you. it can use you against you.”
“that’s why there are a bunch of yous trying to kill me?”
“jeongguk, you have to go.”
“where are you, hyung?” asks jeongguk. he’s trembling, but—it’s not the worst he’s faced, he tells himself. he’s fought aliens and the other avengers. he’s fought criminals and murderers.
but he’s never fought seokjin. and—these aren’t seokjin. but they might as well be.
“jeongguk, no.”
“i’m not leaving here without you.”
“jeongguk—”
and then the other iron men decide to attack.
jeongguk swears as he leaps out of the way of the first blast, taking off between the houses again. if he can just find seokjin, maybe he wouldn’t have to fight the other armor. he can hear seokjin yelling at him, but jeongguk can’t reply as a blast hits the house next to him and he’s swept away by the debris. rolling, jeongguk fires one of his own explosive webs at the nearest suit of armor, watching it get knocked back enough to let jeongguk roll back up again.
“hyung, where are you?” jeongguk yells again, shooting a web out at the house across the street and using it to leap into the air on it. he turns before he lands, shooting out a plethora of webs at the three iron man suits that are pursuing him; he manages to clog their boosters, but he knows it won’t last long, and he’s hopping off of the house into the backyard in a moment.
there’s already another suit of armor there, and jeongguk can’t dive out of the way in time for it to fly into him, hand around his throat as it pushes him through the house; the wall breaks under the force, smashing into jeongguk’s back, and he growls as he fights against it, trying to ignore the pain. they finally burst through the last wall into the street again, and the suit lets go of him to send him flying into the street.
jeongguk shoots out a web instead, connecting it with the suit as he wraps both hands around the string of webbing and yanks it toward him. using his own momentum, he drags the suit toward him and kicks it in the head, although it doesn’t do much other than send it sailing into the ground. he doesn’t know how to defeat them where there’s nothing inside, when he’s never had to fight seokjin before—not like this. they’ve done training, but jeongguk has never had to kill him, and he has no time to think before he’s hit with another blast and goes flying across the street again.
he skids across the broken pavement, groaning. “hyung,” he tries again. “please. i can’t fight them like this.”
as if on cue, another suit lands directly on top of him, punching him in the face. jeongguk’s head snaps sideways, blood bursting inside of his mask, and he goes for the glowing arc reactor in the middle of the suit’s chest, it core—the one thing he knows still keeps seokjin alive. he plants a ball of webbing with stunning properties, watching as it effectively electrocutes the suit right off of him.
“i’m in the trees,” seokjin finally rasps, and jeongguk looks up to see a large patch of trees where the street ends. a path has been cut through it, broken branches and trunks leading him right where seokjin will likely be.
“i’m coming,” says jeongguk firmly, leaving no room for seokjin to argue as he rolls and gets up again. he runs for the trees, pausing only when he’s suddenly aware of an oncoming grenade. jeongguk turns and catches it, panicking for a mere moment before he sends it flying back into the group of iron men pursuing him. it explodes in the air, raining parts back down on him, and jeongguk runs for the nearest house.
he scales it quickly, throwing out weaponized webs as he does in an attempt to combat the group of iron men. once he gets to the top of the house, he races across it, spotting an iron man suit flying over him. at the last second, he sends a web string out for it, not to attack, but to fly; as soon as the web connects, he swings on it, letting go when he’s high enough over the ground that he can turn, activating the wings between his arms and torso. like that, he sails over the trees, enhanced sight in his suit searching for any signs of seokjin.
finally, he spots him—not far from the edge, huddled against a few broken logs. “hyung!” jeongguk calls as he snaps his wings back in and dives down instead, using the trees to soften his landing. he skids onto the ground with a huff, running for seokjin as he glances up and waits for any signs of the other suits. it seems they haven’t followed him into the trees, though, and he’s grateful as he reaches seokjin, falling to his knees and pulling off his mask.
“hyung, oh my god,” he gasps, seeing the damage; half of seokjin’s mask has been destroyed, revealing a bloodied and bruised face within. his suit has gone almost entirely dead, the glowing lights flickering in and out as it struggles not to give out. other parts of the suit have been destroyed as well, showing seokjin’s battered body through it, and seokjin himself—his breathing is shallow at best, blood pouring from wounds over his eyebrow and cheek.
“guk-ah,” groans seokjin, reaching for him.
jeongguk’s hands flutter uselessly in front of him. “what do i do?” he whispers, tears springing to his eyes. it’s not the first time seokjin has been badly injured, he knows—not the first time jeongguk has seen him this badly injured, either. but somehow, this is worse. “hyung, what do i do?”
“go,” seokjin rasps. “you have to get out of here.”
“hyung, i’m taking you to the hospital.”
“they’ll kill you.”
“they’ll kill you. i can’t—i can’t leave you here!” he has no idea how long it’ll take for the other suits of armor to get here, or why they’re not pursuing them now. seokjin’s injuries can be healed, but only if jeongguk does something about them now.
seokjin laughs weakly, leaning over enough to spit blood from his mouth. “i’ll be fine, kid,” he says. “i’m iron man.”
“you’re still human,” jeongguk protests, and is about to physically drag seokjin up with him when he sees seokjin’s face change, eyes widening in panic as his mouth opens to yell something—but jeongguk doesn’t hear it before something tackles him, sending him flying through the trees.
when he lands, rolling in order to get up, jeongguk sees—himself. or: another spider-man, in the exact same suit. seokjin had said the weapon could likely replicate whoever was fighting it, and now that jeongguk has fought it, it’s been able to create another one of him. which means jeongguk now has to fight himself, has to think of the best way to defeat himself—
“fuck off!” he shouts, shooting a ball of webbing at the other spider-man and succeeding in sticking its arm to the nearest tree. “just leave us alone!”
the other spider-man shoots webbing at him in return, and jeongguk ducks under it before he takes off running for seokjin again. he doesn’t get far enough before he’s intercepted by a second spider-man, one that shoots an explosive ball of webbing at him. jeongguk isn’t fast enough to move out of the way, the webbing hitting the edge of his foot, and he goes flying further into the forest as pain immediately burns through his foot.
by the time he looks up, they’ve multiplied again: a handful of spider-mans leaping out from between the trees, and jeongguk curses before he sends a three-pronged web out at them. they don’t hit their marks, and he finds himself rolling and leaping and battling himself over and over, shooting out different webs in hopes of something working. but they’re faster, seem to have even better control of the suit than he does. there are more of them, too, leaving him exhausted by the time he’s run out of the trees entirely.
he’s pursued by a smattering of webs, and this time, he’s not fast enough. they wrap around him, cocooning his arms to his sides and his legs together as he falls to the ground. jeongguk yells in frustration, rolling in time to see that—the spider-men haven’t come after him further than the edge of the forest. just as the iron men didn’t come into the trees, the spider-men don’t come out.
“fuck,” jeongguk groans, trying to wiggle out of the webbing. he knows he has webbing that can melt it with something acidic, but his hands are suctioned against his thighs, and he tries turning them.
“jeongguk?” he hears.
“hyung!” gasps jeongguk. “hyung, please—i’m stuck.” he squeezes his eyes shut, trying as hard as he can to turn his hands. it hurts so badly; his entire body is exhausted, he’s bleeding, he’s broken. but seokjin needs him. iron man needs him. and jeongguk has spent so many years needing seokjin, relying on him for everything. now, when the time has finally come for jeongguk to return the favour, he’s been beaten by his own fucking suit, the webbing so tight that it’s beginning to cut off circulation in his arms and feet.
“jeongguk,” he hears again, but realizes—he doesn’t have his mask on. he shouldn’t be able to hear seokjin without a means of communication, and if he can hear him, it means seokjin is close enough. he opens his eyes, lifting his head enough to see seokjin limping out of the trees. he’s gotten out of the iron man armor, his own clothes torn and bloody as he limps toward jeongguk.
“hyung, no!” he yells. “stay there, i’m—i’m coming.” jeongguk growls again, trying with all of his strength to break out of the webbing, to turn his hands at least, to do something. he could flood everything with the acidic webbing, but then he would hurt himself. but maybe he could help seokjin, then, maybe—
he stops when he hears the familiar sound of the iron man armor’s boosters. he tilts his head back in time to see one suit of armor flying into his eyesight, hovering above him. and jeongguk stops breathing, terror filling him as he realizes—he’s going to die. he’s going to die here at the hands of the iron man suit and the world is going to think that seokjin killed him and then seokjin will be a criminal, will be thrown into prison, will be disgraced for the rest of his life.
“jeongguk!” seokjin calls, closer now.
jeongguk’s eyes suddenly brim with tears, watching as the iron man armor above him holds up his arm, palm out. pointed right at jeongguk. he knows, without having to see, that it’s not going to be a little blast, not going to be anything careful. it’s going to be with everything that the suit has, everything that will leave jeongguk as nothing but a bug splattered on the pavement.
he grits his teeth again, trying to wiggle his hands just a little more. he succeeds in turning them just slightly, trying harder now that he knows this is the last moment, this is all he has. he’s going to die here, he’s going to die—the palm of the iron man suit begins lighting up, parts of the wrist and arm twisting as it accommodates for the amount of power and pressure going into the blast, and jeongguk feels his tears spill over, still trying to turn his hands little by little; it’s almost there, he can do it, and the whine of the powering blast is almost too high to hear, and the armor is going to shoot, and he can do it—
then, suddenly, jeongguk hears his name yelled too close. he turns his head at the last second, seeing seokjin close enough to touch and still running, still limping. he’s bloody and broken and jeongguk gets it immediately, what he means to do.
“hyung, no—” jeongguk shouts, finally managing to turn his hands and flooding his palms with acidic webbing, immediately breaking out the web cocoon around him. but it’s too late—seokjin is already throwing himself into jeongguk’s path, and the iron man armor lets off the blast it was building, strong and bright enough that jeongguk throws himself to the side in an attempt to protect himself. he’s blown backwards along the ground with the force of it, feet immediately in pain as the explosion must hit him, and he feels the entire street shake as the world explodes around and over and within him.
for a long minute after, jeongguk can’t hear anything but a dull whine. when he opens his eyes, all he sees is smoke and darkness, and then small chunks of pavement falling around him. he looks down to see the feet of his suit have been torn off to reveal his own feet beneath, now bloody. ignoring it, he immediately rolls over, coughing violently as he struggles to pull himself up.
he stumbles through the smoke, finding the entire street nothing but a crater of pavement and ground. jeongguk coughs again, his hearing slowing returning to him in time to hear the falling pavement, and—nothing.
no other iron men, no other spider-men. just jeongguk and the smoke.
then he sees seokjin.
a guttural cry rips itself out of jeongguk’s throat as he stumbles away from the crater to where seokjin is laying, not moving. not moving. he must have been thrown by the force of the blast, and jeongguk coughs violently as he finally gets to seokjin’s side, collapsing beside him. seokjin’s eyes are closed, his body a mess of blood and soot. he can see bone from somewhere, can see—seokjin’s chest moving just shallowly, meaning he’s alive.
jeongguk sobs, tears immediately spilling over onto his cheeks as he takes a moment to lean his head on seokjin’s chest. he’s unconscious, but alive. “hyung,” jeongguk chokes out, ignoring his own pain in favour of trying to do something about seokjin’s. “iron man. c’mon, iron man.” he lifts his head again, wiping at his wets eye to see—the arc reactor in seokjin’s chest flickering, on the verge of going out.
jeongguk’s breath hitches as he watches it.
seokjin is unconscious and badly injured. but he’s never seen the arc reactor like that, the one thing that’s keeping seokjin’s heart going. and jeongguk knows, suddenly—if he doesn’t do something now, seokjin is going to die.
iron man is going to die.
everything goes a bit blurry. later, jeongguk won’t be able to recount any of it—maybe from the amount of pain he’s in, or how intensely emotional he is, or how desperate. he won’t know where the adrenaline and strength came from, or how he knew the way to the hospital without his mask at all. he cares not if anyone sees him without the mask, if anyone thinks it strange to see spider-man desperately soaring over the city with a broken man in his arms.
all he knows is that he can’t let anything happen to seokjin. not now, not ever. seokjin—is more than just iron man. he’s more than a celebrity or a billionaire or the head of his company. he’s more than an avenger. he’s more than jeongguk’s mentor, more than the person who believed in him and gave him a chance.
seokjin is—jeongguk’s friend. jeongguk’s brother. seokjin has been every reason jeongguk wanted to do good in the first place, to be like him—to make him proud.
so jeongguk makes him proud.
he gets seokjin to the nearest hospital, shouting something about iron man as though the whole world doesn’t know who he is, and there are nurses and doctors shouting, racing, taking him away—and jeongguk watches them go, chest beginning to heave with the force of his own sobs, vision blurring with his own tears. he begins to follow, pulled by an invisible force, but jeongguk only gets one step after them before he collapses from exhaustion and pain, everything going dark before his head even hits the ground.
✴ ✴ ✴
when jeongguk wakes, it’s with a gasp, his body and mind propelling himself back into reality as his eyes snap open. he looks up at the white ceiling, over at the white walls, down at the white sheets. he’s confused for a time, trying to remember what last happened before he fell asleep, or—passed out? he remembers the park with yoongi, the hammock, yoongi pressing his lips to jeongguk’s through the mask, and then—
his stomach lurches, sitting up and scrambling to toss the sheets off of himself. he’s in the hospital, he realizes, in a bed with an iv stuck in his arm, and he grabs for it only for a hand to stop him, eyes snapping upward to see yoongi sitting beside him, panic clear on his face.
“jeongguk,” he says.
“seokjin-hyung,” croaks jeongguk, throat scratchy and burning. “i have to—to get to seokjin-hyung!”
“jeongguk, stop,” says yoongi, trying to force jeongguk’s hands away from the iv in his arm. despite the fact that jeongguk has superhuman strength, yoongi does a good job of it—or maybe jeongguk is just weak. it comes back to him in pieces now: how exhausted he was, how spent and injured. he’s aware, suddenly, of bandages wrapped around his feet and other parts of his body that he didn’t even realize were injured when he got here, and there’s a stupid iv—
“let go of me,” growls jeongguk, summoning up as much strength as he can to shove yoongi backwards. this time, it works—or yoongi just lets him go, realizing it’s useless to fight him. instead, yoongi reaches out and presses the call button beside jeongguk’s bed, but jeongguk is already tearing the iv out of his arm and stumbling out of bed. he almost collapses the moment his feet touch the ground, pain screaming up his legs, but he clamps his teeth down on the inside of his cheek until he tastes blood, forcing himself through it as he stumbles toward the door.
yoongi is hot on his heels. “where are you going?” he demands. “jeongguk, you’re injured. come back!”
“he’s hurt!” shouts jeongguk, yanking open the door and stumbling into the hall. he looks both ways, nothing looking familiar. “i have to get to him, i have to—i have to make sure he’s okay.” tears sting at his eyes suddenly, both from the physical pain and the emotional pain, the desperation, the worry and the panic. he pauses, turning to look back at yoongi with wet eyes. “yoongi, i have to save him.”
he doesn’t ask how yoongi got here, how yoongi knew that jeongguk was here. he doesn’t ask how long he’s been out or the extent of his own injuries. and yoongi doesn’t tell him any of it, doesn’t ask jeongguk what happened or how they ended up here. he doesn’t even ask why jeongguk is so adamant about finding seokjin—because he must know. and he must understand, just from jeongguk’s eyes, that there is only one way onward.
“alright,” says yoongi, then, approaching him. “okay, jeongguk. let me help you walk, at least. i know where he is.”
yoongi helps him down the hallway. they meet nurses halfway, rushing toward his room, and jeongguk starts yelling at them when they try to take him back to his room, demanding to see seokjin first. he ignores the crestfallen looks on their faces, and they must understand the way yoongi does, because they take him there. they take him to the operating room where they’ve been working on seokjin for the past two hours, trying to fix the wounds within him. they let yoongi and jeongguk stand where other doctors and surgeons might to watch, a massive wall of glass separating them from the operating room.
jeongguk places his hand against the glass, pressing as close as he can to see inside. there: a handful of surgeons in white and blue, surrounding the operating table. they move quickly and efficiently, handing each other tools and moving from tray to tray. there: dozens of machines feeding back to the operating table, lights and screens and cameras.
there: iron man in the middle of it all, still unconscious. he’s still as bloody as he was when jeongguk found him after the explosion. they haven’t fixed the broken bone jeongguk noticed. he can’t even tell what they’re doing, what they’re operating on—can’t even tell what there is to operate on.
but he doesn’t see iron man. he doesn’t see kim seokjin: genius, billionaire, playboy, philanthropist. all jeongguk sees is the person who has loved him most, who has cared for him, who has taken the time to show jeongguk that he can do something with what he has been given in life—even the shitty things. he sees someone who has lasted through so much, through hardship and heartache and so many people trying to kill him. he sees someone who has looked death in the eye and told it to fuck off.
“c’mon, iron man,” jeongguk whispers, tears welling in his eyes again. he’s aware, only vaguely, of yoongi taking his other hand, holding it tight. “c’mon, iron man. you can’t go yet. you’re not supposed to go yet.”
“jeongguk,” says yoongi quietly. “they said he sustained a lot of damage to his internal organs.”
“shut up,” whispers jeongguk.
“he has a lot of internal bleeding,” adds yoongi. “broken bones that punctured stuff.”
“i said, shut up.”
“jeongguk,” and it’s barely more than a whisper. maybe yoongi is doing him a favour here, letting him know. preparing him. “they said that thing in his chest probably can’t take it.” it wouldn’t be the first time seokjin’s arc reactor posed a threat. but he could always come back from it—he always found a way.
because he’s iron man. and more than being a genius and rich and determined, seokjin is a symbol for the entire world. the avengers may be a symbol of strength, each their own symbol of peace and freedom and heroism. but seokjin has always been something more—fortitude and sticking to beliefs and a reason to keep fighting.
he has always been jeongguk’s reason to keep fighting.
“he has to wake up,” whispers jeongguk, wishing he could push some of his own strength into the operating room, just give it to seokjin the way seokjin has given him so much. “he can’t—he can’t give up because of this.” and how stupid would it be, this accident: it was no invasion, no battle against a villain that wants to destroy all of earth. iron man will not have died fighting for earth the way he has fought for earth for years.
he will have died… for nothing.
(for jeongguk.)
(for nothing.)
they stand there for what seems like hours, staring in as the surgeons work and work and work, and the arc reactor in seokjin’s chest continues to flicker. nothing seems to change, not even them—jeongguk stands with his hand pressed to the glass, breath fogging it. yoongi stands beside him, fingers threaded through jeongguk’s. they wait. they wait.
and then, suddenly—
there’s a flurry of activity, movement within the operating room, and jeongguk squeezes yoongi’s hand without meaning to, panicked and—his eyes move to the vital signs monitor beside the bed, and it’s flat, the line is fucking flat—
they try to resuscitate him once, twice. jeongguk presses his forehead to the glass, not breathing, not breathing, tears brimming in his eyes, and he thinks—c’mon iron man. c’mon seokjin. one more time. come back one more time.
but the line stays flat.
his arc reactor flickers once, twice, and then goes out. jeongguk stares at it, waits. waits. but it doesn’t turn back on. the line doesn’t jump. seokjin doesn’t breathe.
and they stop. they just—stop. jeongguk can just hear the high whine of a flatline through the glass—everything else is so silent. everyone is so silent.
it’s just—iron man on an operating table.
dead.
jeongguk stares, and he stares, and he stares. and seokjin just stays dead. for a horrible, suffocating moment, it’s as though the entire world stops. everything hangs suspended between a world where iron man is alive, where he defends the big guy and the little guy, too, where it is inconceivable that he could ever not exist—and a world where he doesn’t exist anymore. where the sun continues to rise and fall, where life must go on without kim seokjin. without iron man.
and it doesn’t make any fucking sense.
it doesn’t make sense that iron man should die, that jeongguk should wake up and seokjin isn’t there—isn’t there to nag him about doing homework and not getting into trouble, isn’t there for jeongguk to beg to take him on avenger adventures. isn’t there for jeongguk to call when he needs help, isn’t there for the whole world to look up to as their avenger. he was always in their corner. jeongguk doesn’t know how to just live without him. he doesn’t get it.
but then, just like that, the moment is over. the surgeons move again, removing their tools, covering seokjin. cleaning. marking down the time of death, knowing someone will have to make a statement to the media if they’re not already swarming the hospital, and then it’s just iron man on an operating table with a sheet covering him, and that’s it.
iron man is dead.
and jeongguk—doesn’t cry. he doesn’t scream or bang his fists against the glass, not like he thought he would. he doesn’t say anything at all, doesn’t make a single fucking noise. he just takes a breath, drops his hand, and goes utterly and completely numb.
somehow, he gets home. maybe it’s a day later, maybe two—after the doctors have decided he’s safe to go, whether because he can heal on his own or because it’s possible at all, the media beginning to back down just a little. no one cares about him, anyway, without his mask. no one cares about anything but iron man. iron man, dead.
so somehow, he gets home. it’s yoongi, he thinks—but he stops paying attention. he barely eats, barely sleeps. yoongi takes him home and helps him shower, helps him dress and eat. changes his bandages, gives him medicine. yoongi sits beside him in bed and tries to help him, hand in jeongguk’s hair, but jeongguk turns away. he tries to talk, but jeongguk doesn’t fucking want to listen. jeongguk doesn’t talk back. he just closes his eyes, but even that’s worse—he has nightmares about it, about countless iron men trying to hurt him and all of them having seokjin’s face, or jeongguk being one of them, being the one to end it all.
he refuses to turn on the news, refuses to even look at his phone. sometimes there’s knock at the door and yoongi will lean over him in bed, jeongguk’s face to the wall, and will gently card his fingers through jeongguk’s hair. will tuck a piece behind his ear, yoongi’s own blonde and red hair tickling jeongguk’s cheek. will tell him he has a visitor—jimin or namjoon, or one of the others. they keep coming back, no matter how many times jeongguk just turns away from yoongi, knowing he’ll understand what it means.
he doesn’t want to see them. he doesn’t want to go to avengers headquarters, doesn’t want to talk about it—because they will. they’ll want to know what happened in that last fight, knowing jeongguk is the only witness. they’ll want to talk about seokjin’s legacy, about the good old days before jeongguk was even spider-man. they’ll want to remember him. they’ll want to mourn.
jeongguk thinks, briefly, of a psychology class he took in his first year, one about death and dying. he thinks, briefly, of learning about how important it is to mourn and grieve, to have a community during tragedy. to say goodbye, to let go. he thinks, too, that this is just easier, that it hurts less: to keep the covers up to his chin, to keep the curtains drawn. to ignore yoongi every time he asks jeongguk if he wants to take a walk with him today, or if he wants to watch a funny movie, or if he wants to talk. about anything—about school, about dogs, about anime.
he doesn’t. days pass slowly, but surely. one, then two, then three—four or five, maybe, jeongguk doesn’t know. he stops paying attention, too upset and numb and tired to do anything at all. yoongi is trying. but he just doesn’t understand. he couldn’t—he’s not even from earth. with this new thought, everything yoongi does for him begins to irritate him. he flinches away from yoongi sitting next to him and putting a hand on his shoulder or petting his hair. he frowns at yoongi pulling him out of bed for a shower and food. he doesn’t want that—not from yoongi, not from anyone.
it takes almost a week for it to come to a head, the grief and anger bottled up inside of jeongguk beginning to boil. he’s trying to sleep, almost noon, when he hears the door open and close, signalling yoongi’s return from wherever he went early.
“jeongguk,” says yoongi, always soft, like jeongguk is breakable—“i got food for you, if you—”
“would you just fuck off?” jeongguk snaps, sitting up and throwing the covers down into his lap. yoongi freezes at the door, still toeing off his shoes with a bag of food in his hand. “i don’t need your fucking help! just go back to your own fucking planet and leave me alone.”
yoongi stares at him, shock written all over his face. and jeongguk should feel bad—it’s just about the first thing he’s said to yoongi in a week, the first time he’s acknowledged anything that yoongi is doing for him. but suddenly, all of the emotion that he’s been holding in for a week is pouring out, yoongi as the only available target, and he can’t stop it.
“excuse me?” yoongi finally asks.
“you heard me,” says jeongguk. “what are you even doing here? you keep trying to feed me and take care of me, but i’m fine without you. i was fine before, and i’ll be fine now! just because—because my hero and mentor and idol and the only person who was there for me through everything and taught me how to be a good fucking person is d-dead—” he stops, suddenly overwhelmed with all of his emotion, and tears spring to his eyes. he tries to keep yelling, tries to keep being angry, because that’s easier, but—he’s crying, suddenly, unable to get the words out around his sobbing. he feels the bed dip, feels arms around him, and he goes willingly, letting yoongi pull him into his chest. and jeongguk just—cries. finally, he lets himself cry.
“oh, jeongguk,” whispers yoongi, holding him close, holding him tight. he presses a kiss to the top of jeongguk’s head. “it’s okay, baby. let it out.”
“g-go away,” sobs jeongguk, pushing weakly at yoongi’s chest. “i don’t w-want you.”
“i know,” says yoongi. “i know you want him. that’s okay.”
“you don’t get it. you can’t get it.”
“you’re right, jeongguk. i can’t. but i get grief and losing someone very close to you. and i’m not going anywhere, because i know you need me.”
jeongguk hiccups through his sobs, pushing his face into yoongi’s neck. part of him wants to push yoongi away, but another part—the bigger part—wants to pull him closer, never wants yoongi to let him go. he’s been so adamant about not even thinking about seokjin’s death, but here it is: he can’t escape it. no matter how many days he spends in bed, seokjin is still dead. no matter how hard he tries to ignore it, seokjin is still always dead.
he stops trying to argue with yoongi or push him away, instead allowing himself to cry. and yoongi holds him, arms wrapped tightly around him, hand carding through jeongguk’s hair. they sit there as jeongguk cries for a long, long time—until he’s exhausted himself with it, until he has nothing left to cry. instead, he sniffs into yoongi’s neck, realizing he’s fisted his hands in yoongi’s shirt as though to keep him close, as though afraid he would leave now that jeongguk finally let him in.
eventually, he moves, pulling his face away and frowning at the massive wet patch he’s left on the collar of yoongi’s shirt. “sorry,” he whispers, and yoongi laughs a little, wiping jeongguk’s hair off of his forehead. with gentle hands, he thumbs at the wetness on jeongguk’s cheeks, wiping away the tears clinging to his eyelashes and the corners of his eyes.
“do you feel better?” yoongi asks.
reluctantly, jeongguk nods. he shifts a little, getting into a more comfortable position as he puts his head on yoongi’s other shoulder.
gingerly, yoongi adds, “do you want to talk about it?”
jeongguk has had a week to think about it. even though he tried not to, the thoughts pressed in—the memories, the doubts, the fears. and all it has led him to one conclusion, which he now whispers between them as though speaking it any louder makes it real: “it’s my fault.”
“no, it’s not,” says yoongi immediately.
“he wouldn’t have d-died if it weren’t for me,” says jeongguk. “we were fighting some—some replications of ourselves and i couldn’t defeat myself. i was too slow and weak and stupid, and they cocooned me. i couldn’t get out and—and they were going to kill me, but he jumped—” fresh tears well in his eyes as he sees it now, as though it’s happening all over again. yoongi’s hand is already on his face, wiping away the tears as they spill onto his cheeks. “he jumped in front of me to save me, and he took the hit, and now he’s gone. but if i had just—been better—”
“jeongguk, no,” says yoongi. he tugs on jeongguk, manhandling him until he’s sitting up and facing yoongi. and yoongi looks—sad. looks pained, just from seeing jeongguk in pain. “it’s not your fault at all. you couldn’t have changed what happened.”
“but i could have,” insists jeongguk. “if i had been better at fighting and defending him, i could have saved him. if i had been quicker getting there, o-or smarter in my strategy, i could have gotten him out before. he could be here.”
“that’s not how life works,” says yoongi. “there are a million possibilities, but you can’t keep blaming yourself for not choosing a different option. you didn’t know what was going to happen, jeongguk. and you did what you could—you did what you thought was best in that moment, and it was. but sometimes, people still get hurt.”
“i could have stopped him.”
“it wasn’t up to you to decide what he did, jeongguk.” yoongi wipes at his cheeks again, holding his face so gently, keeping him so close. “you didn’t make him jump in front of you. you didn’t make him sacrifice himself for you. that was his decision. that was his choice.”
“but why?” cries jeongguk, sagging into yoongi again. “why did he have to?”
“because,” sighs yoongi, “that’s what people do when they love someone. they take care of them—they protect them, they do what’s best for them. sometimes that means making them soup when they’re sick. sometimes that means being honest with them when they’re being a shitty friend. and sometimes—sometimes it means sacrificing themselves to keep the person they love safe.”
jeongguk sniffs. he doesn’t like it—doesn’t want to listen to yoongi, doesn’t want to find any comfort in it. but he knows that yoongi is right. “it still isn’t fair,” he whispers. “it isn’t right. he wasn’t supposed to die—not like that, anyway. the world wasn’t ready to lose him.” he turns his face into yoongi’s shoulder again, hands tightening in his shirt. “i wasn’t ready to lose him.”
yoongi sighs, leaning his cheek against the top of jeongguk’s head. and jeongguk decides he likes this much better than trying to ignore yoongi all of the time. “i know,” says yoongi. “and i’m sorry you did lose him. and i don’t know how to make it better, but i’m not going anywhere. one day, it won’t hurt so much.”
“i don’t want to live in a world without him in it,” whispers jeongguk. “it doesn’t make sense. he’s—he’s iron man. he’s supposed to be here.”
“but he’s not, jeongguk. you have to accept that.”
“can you let me be sad about it for a bit?” grumbles jeongguk. “just cuddle me and pet my hair and let me be sad. you can talk about being better tomorrow.” tomorrow, he’ll say the same thing. and he knows it’ll take a long, long time for him to come to any sort of place where he’s even remotely okay with seokjin’s death, but this is day one. this is him accepting help, letting yoongi take care of him. that’s all he can manage for now.
yoongi kisses the top of his head again. “okay,” he whispers. “whatever you want, baby.”
what he wants is seokjin—a world where seokjin didn’t die, a world where jeongguk was strong enough to save him. he wants a world where maybe neither of them was a superhero in the first place, just friends. just two people who happened to meet and lived forever instead of this.
he can recognize, though, that he can’t have that. instead, he and yoongi pile into his bed, pull the covers up to their chins, and watch a marathon of studio ghibli movies. and yoongi holds him, fingers moving slowly through his hair, as jeongguk feels warm and safe for the first time since the hospital—since the fight. he lets himself feel safe. and he knows he won’t feel whole or happy, not without seokjin, but this is a good start. yoongi is always a good start.
when jeongguk has just begun to drift off, mind turning soft and malleable, he turns his face a little more into yoongi’s neck, where he’s been resting. “yoonie,” he mumbles, struggling to keep his eyes open.
“hm?”
“sorry,” jeongguk whispers. “about before. i didn’t mean what i said.” yoongi doesn’t say anything, fingers toying with the shell of jeongguk’s ear. “i don’t want you to go anywhere. i like when you’re here. with me.”
“i like when i’m here with you, too,” says yoongi. in his sleepiness, jeongguk can’t ignore the way his heart leaps at that, stomach jittery and giddy with want and so much more.
he sighs, burrowing into yoongi’s neck. “i just wish i could have seokjin-hyung, too. i wish i could have you both.”
✴ ✴ ✴
jeongguk wakes to yoongi nudging him gently, pulled back into consciousness bit by bit until he’s opening his eyes, squinting in the low lighting in the room. there’s a lamp on somewhere, casting everything in an orange glow, and jeongguk shifts so he can see yoongi still lying next to him. he’s propped up on one elbow, though, watching jeongguk with something urgent in his eyes.
“jeongguk,” whispers yoongi. “are you awake?”
jeongguk makes a groaning noise, rolling into yoongi so he can plant his face in yoongi’s chest. “no.”
“i’ve been thinking—”
“weren’t you sleeping?”
he can feel yoongi shrug, shirt moving just slightly. jeongguk remembers falling asleep wrapped up in yoongi, eyes sore and swollen from crying, but feeling loved. feeling as though maybe he hadn’t been abandoned, after all.
jeongguk lifts his head, blinking sleepily. “what is it?” he finally whispers.
yoongi cups his cheek, runs his thumb over jeongguk’s cheekbone. “what if there was a way?”
“to what?”
“to have us both. to have seokjin. to bring him back.”
jeongguk stares up at yoongi, wondering if he’s dreaming. nothing yoongi is saying makes sense to him, and he can’t decide if it’s because yoongi is talking nonsense or because jeongguk’s brain has yet to wake up. “what?”
“i was thinking about stories i’ve heard from home,” says yoongi. “about technology that can prolong life or reverse the effects of aging and disease.” his eyes are bright in the darkness, convinced of his own words, but jeongguk just continues to stare at him. “look, jeongguk,” says yoongi, smoothing down some of jeongguk’s hair. “i still have my ship here. and there’s always a bunch of contraxian tech on there—weapons and medical supplies and other stuff. there might be something we can use.”
“what are you talking about?”
“jeongguk. i think we can bring seokjin back from the dead.”
✴ ✴ ✴
by some miracle, they haven’t buried seokjin’s body yet. they, as in—the other avengers. they, as in—the people jeongguk has been avoiding for the past week, not wanting to let them in. but when yoongi tells him that there might be a possibility that they can bring seokjin back, jeongguk throws all caution to the wind. he puts his grieving on hold, clinging to that spark of hope that there might be a way, there might be a chance. yoongi reminds him constantly that he has no idea if they’ll find something that will do what they want, but jeongguk cares little for the warnings and hiccups.
if there’s a chance that they could bring seokjin back, that he could have seokjin back—he’ll do whatever it takes.
they ransack yoongi’s ship, still parked in one of the underground hangers below kim tower. it’s the first time jeongguk has been on a space ship, and although he’s curious about how everything works, he has but one mission in mind: find some contraxian technology that will save seokjin. they arm themselves with all of the contraxian technology they can find, the medical supplies onboard every ship, and plenty of bits and pieces that yoongi thinks they can build into something that might be useful.
and then they go to avengers headquarters. a week of radio silence from jeongguk, and then he just shows up—and he knows they’ll be worried for him, want to coddle him. seokjin meant so much to all of them, but no one loved him like jeongguk.
they’re all there—even hoseok, taking time away from leading his own people just to be here, just to mourn. seeing all of them, having them fawn over him, makes him feel guilty for ignoring their attempts to reach out. makes him feel guilty that he made yoongi promise they wouldn’t tell, wouldn’t admit that they’re only here to try and bring seokjin back to life. something tells him they wouldn’t be fond of the idea.
after spending most of the day with the others, letting them feed him and comfort him, joining in with the community for some time, he and yoongi sneak into the chamber where seokjin’s body is being held. when jeongguk sees it for the first time—still battered and broken, never healing, he has to keep himself from throwing up. all of it comes back to him in that moment: finding seokjin in the forest, helplessly watching as the imposter iron man armor readied its weapons to kill him, seokjin jumping into the line of fire at the last second. his resolve threatens to crumble, his mind and body wanting nothing more than to break down.
at his side, yoongi squeezes his shoulder. “you okay?” he murmurs.
“m’fine,” says jeongguk firmly. he’ll pretend this isn’t seokjin at all—he’ll pretend this is a science experiment, some bit of homework. he’ll pretend it’s all a fantasy. he’ll pretend he lives in a universe where he doesn’t have to do this at all.
he allows himself just one moment to look at seokjin’s cold body and mourn all that he’s lost.
and then he and yoongi get to work.
it’s hours and hours of slaving over the technology they’ve brought with him. jeongguk tells the others that he just needs some time with seokjin’s body, counting on their need to placate him and let him mourn, so they don’t bother he and yoongi other than to knock once in a while to ask if they need anything. again, jeongguk feels guilty for tricking them like this, knowing they’re only trying to help—but when he and yoongi manage to bring seokjin back, they won’t care that he used their kindness like this.
except nothing he and yoongi do works.
they work with the medication that yoongi has, mixing it together and trying to inject it into seokjin’s chest. some concoction in the first aid kid is apparently meant to act like a defibrillator, the liquid injected into the chest sparking the heart into action again—but even after they try the injection several times, nothing happens.
“he’s probably been gone for too long,” yoongi mutters when jeongguk swears at the medication. “this is really meant to just be in the case of an emergency.”
they try other means to physically bring seokjin back, even going so far as to rewire a contraxian weapon that normally disintegrates someone in hopes of somehow reversing the effects and bringing seokjin back. all it does is heal some of his wounds—it does work, then, but only on the physical level. seokjin doesn’t breathe. he doesn’t open his eyes.
they work with other technology that yoongi brought with him from contraxia: something to create electricity in his brain in hopes that it might spark something; a device that can be used to heal animals and revive them for short periods of time so that someone having to hunt for food can exist on the same animal for months, if needed; something that can animate inanimate objects.
but nothing works.
they try and try and try, device after device. they mix and match, trying everything as soon as a new idea comes up. jeongguk tries digging around in the software that exists in the avengers headquarters, trying to convince it to make a new fucking arc reactor—seokjin lived with an artificial heart for years, so why can’t they just give him a new one? why can’t that work?
but it doesn’t. it’s impossible.
after hours of work, finally having run out of ideas, jeongguk collapses onto the floor in the midst of all of their work; devices and tools are scattered around him, looking like a mild apocalypse has happened in the room. and seokjin’s body is still there, preserved in a special pod. he’s still not breathing. he’s still dead.
“fuck,” jeongguk says, voicing his frustration for the first time since they got here. “fuck.” he presses the heels of his palms into his eyes to quell the tears that he knows will come; he allowed himself to hope for this, to believe that they could find a way to bring seokjin back. and now, finally facing a dead end, he doesn’t know how to give up again. he doesn’t know how to admit that they can’t do that, doesn’t know how to accept the fact that seokjin is dead all over again. he doesn’t want to. he can’t.
“jeongguk—” sighs yoongi, standing behind him.
“fuck!” jeongguk yells, picking up the nearest object—a little metal box that can read vital signs, and throws it across the room. it hits the wall and falls to the ground with a loud thump, and it doesn’t even make him feel better. “this isn’t fair!”
“jeongguk.”
“you said it would work,” snaps jeongguk, rubbing at his eyes. “you promised.”
“i told you it might not,” counters yoongi. “don’t get upset with me when i’ve been doing everything i can to help you.”
“this is stupid.” jeongguk lets himself fall back, throwing an arm over his eyes. he just wants something to work. and maybe it was a long shot in the first place, but now he’s determined to find a real solution, one that will actually work. he refuses to give up on seokjin—because seokjin never gave up on him. he might have been harsh on jeongguk sometimes, giving him tough love when he needed it, but he still always believed that jeongguk could reach his dreams and accomplish his goals, he always saw something in jeongguk, even when jeongguk couldn’t see it. even now, he can hear seokjin telling him to get off the goddamn floor.
across the room, there’s a knock at the door. namjoon’s voice is muffled, but clear: “are you okay in there, guk?”
namjoon would know. namjoon is a fucking genius, just like seokjin, and was always working on the science part of their operations. if there was a scientific way to bring seokjin back, he would know. but jeongguk can’t tell namjoon they’re even trying, because namjoon would tell hoseok, and hoseok would tell jimin, and jimin would put jeongguk under house arrest until he learned how to grieve properly.
“jeongguk?”
“i’m fine, hyung,” calls jeongguk, voice croaking. “sorry.”
“we have dinner ready, if you and your friend want to come join us,” says namjoon. “hoseok’s in the middle of excitedly recounting the story of how vision was created, though, fair warning. he’s obsessed with those infinity stones.”
jeongguk sits up, arm falling from his face as he twists around to stare at yoongi.
yoongi stares back. after a prolonged second, he asks, “what?”
“infinity stones,” says jeongguk. “you told me about those.”
“yeah,” says yoongi with a shrug. “they’re tied to different aspects of the universe, basically hidden across the universe although apparently they tend to find their way into human hands.”
“what are they? quickly.” he knows about the infinity stones, of course, because yoongi is right—humans have come in contact with them enough times. for the most part, though, they’ve remained an elusive entity to jeongguk and the rest of the world. he knows they’re extremely powerful and can control things, change things. seokjin, hoseok, and namjoon made a whole avenger out of the mind stone, not to mention there were whole battles for other infinity stones before jeongguk was even spider-man.
but—yoongi knows about them. months ago, yoongi told jeongguk about them, mentioning that he got interested in them due to myths and stories written about them in contraxian literature, and took the time to study them himself. “okay,” says yoongi, still looking at him strangely. “there’s the space stone, the mind stone, the reality stone, the power stone, the time stone, and the soul stone.”
jeongguk’s breath hitches. “what does the soul stone do?”
“it can control the spiritual essence of living or deceased beings, so it’s extremely powerful and dangerous. you could even bring someone back fro—” yoongi stops. his eyes widen. “jeongguk—”
“yoongi, that’s it,” jeongguk gasps, immediately getting up from the floor and rushing toward him. “that’s it! the soul stone—yoongi, we have to find the soul stone! then we can bring seokjin-hyung back. it’s the only way.”
something pained passes over yoongi’s face. “jeongguk, that’s really not a good idea,” he says. “the soul stone possesses the biggest threat to the universe if it falls into the wrong hands. someone could do some serious damage with it.”
“it’s just us,” says jeongguk, excited now. “we’re just going to use it to bring seokjin-hyung back, and then we can put it back or get rid of it or, i don’t know, hand it over to the other avengers. they know how to deal with that stuff.”
“i don’t think you get it.”
“i get that this is the only way we can bring him back,” says jeongguk firmly. “this isn’t just for me. this is about everyone—about having iron man back. he’s more than just my friend, yoongi. he’s a symbol for this world. he’s everything good. we need him. you might not understand how important he is to earth, but i do. earth needs iron man.” of course, jeongguk wants seokjin back—wants his friend, wants his mentor. but what it comes down to is that he can’t let the world go on without iron man when it doesn’t have to. seokjin wasn’t supposed to go out this way, and jeongguk has a chance to change that—to take back what happened, to fix what he broke.
“please, yoongi,” says jeongguk, fingers circling yoongi’s wrist. “please do this for me.”
the pain on yoongi’s face is still there. it looks as though he wants to say something, but holds back—and jeongguk doesn’t quite understand what the apprehension is. he knows this stuff is dangerous, but it’s not the first time jeongguk has handled alien technology or fought a battle or had to be careful. seokjin taught him well. as long as they’re safe and find the soul stone quickly and then dispose of it just as quickly, they can all be happy in the end. they can all win.
whatever yoongi seemed to want to say passes, then, and his face softens. “this is a really bad idea,” says yoongi. “i want you to know that right now. but… you’re right. earth does need iron man. i’ve realized that since i came here. and—i actually have an idea where the soul stone is, anyway.”
jeongguk’s face brightens, immediately throwing himself at yoongi and wrapping him up in a tight hug. “thank you,” he says. “thank you.”
yoongi’s arms wrap loosely around him, still unsure. but jeongguk is sure—jeongguk knows this is the right thing to do. he knows this is what he has to do, no matter what it takes.
“you owe me,” says yoongi. “you better let me try on your dumb suit and shoot webs everywhere.”
jeongguk laughs—for the first time in a week. for the first time since seokjin died, he laughs. “whatever you want, yoongi,” he says. “i’ll give you whatever you want.”
“alright, bug boy,” sighs yoongi, pulling away and poking jeongguk’s nose. “let’s go on a space adventure.”
✴ ✴ ✴
“this is so cool,” breathes jeongguk. he’s strapped into the co-pilot seat of yoongi’s little spaceship, staring out of the window at space. he can see so many stars, lightyears and lightyears of them spread out before him. they have all of this space to fly, all of this space to grow. if they weren’t on a self-appointed mission, jeongguk would wish to spend forever here, exploring each inch of the universe. he wants to go to contraxia, suddenly, wants to see where yoongi grew up, wants to know what it’s like.
but they’re out here for one thing and one thing only. they can come back after seokjin is alive again.
“i always forget that not everyone is used to space travel,” laughs yoongi from the pilot’s seat. he presses a few buttons on the console before setting the ship to autopilot and then undoing his seatbelt. “if we had a really powerful ship, we could just jump right to the planet, but mine isn’t meant for that kind of speed. so it should take us… a few days. you can wait that long?”
“yeah,” jeongguk nods. “i can wait as long as it takes, if it means getting hyung back.”
and yoongi grins at him, something a little sad in it. jeongguk can’t help grinning back. it’s the first time since seokjin died that he’s felt anything other than emptiness or sadness, and he’s grateful for it. grateful for yoongi being here, doing this for him, with him. grateful that this is finally going to work.
jeongguk stays at the front of the ship, too busy staring out of the window to pay attention to anything else. eventually, yoongi comes back with a bag of chips, holding it out for jeongguk to take a few. they’ve stocked up on food and other supplies they might need, just in case the journey takes longer than anticipated, but yoongi seems confident that they’ll be back within a week.
“where is it that we’re going, again?” asks jeongguk, mouth full of food. “i don’t know a lot about other planets.”
yoongi collapses in the pilot’s seat again. “it’s called vormir,” he says. “some barren planet in the middle of the celestial universe. i don’t think anyone lives there, and if they do, they’re cut off from just about everything.” he shrugs. “it’s really just a rumour that the soul stone is there, but like i said, i did a lot of extensive research on the infinity stones when i got interested in them. got into some pretty dark shit along the way, and no one really knows if it’s there because no one has gotten a hold of it.”
jeongguk frowns. “why not?” he asks. “if the soul stone can control life and death like that, you’d think lots of people would want to find it.”
“finding it is one thing,” says yoongi. “obtaining it is another.”
“what does that mean? do we have to fight someone for it?”
“nothing like that,” says yoongi, although his face falls. “like i said, it’s all rumours, so… i guess we’ll see when we get there.” for a moment, he has that look on his face that he did back in avengers headquarters, when jeongguk demanded they find the soul stone in the first place—like there’s something he wants to say, something he’s not telling jeongguk. but this is no time to begin an argument or press yoongi for something he doesn’t want to give. it’s a miracle that he knows where the soul stone is in the first place, and jeongguk wants to remain optimistic about all of this. it’s their one chance to bring seokjin back, and he wants to start it off on a high note.
after a second, yoongi adds, “hey, guk. wanna learn how to fly this thing?”
jeongguk gasps, eyes going wide. “really? you’d let me?”
“of course,” laughs yoongi. “i can tell you’ve been itching to get your hands on the controls. it’s not that hard, anyway.” and jeongguk laughs, getting out of his seat so he can switch with yoongi, hungry eyes watching the console and space and all of this adventure he didn’t know he was missing until now.
they spend the first day fooling around, having fun—or as much fun as they can have in a space ship. jeongguk learns how to fly the ship fairly easily and then refuses to leave the pilot’s seat for a whole hour even though yoongi doesn’t take the ship off of auto-pilot. but jeongguk just likes turning different lights on, making things move, pretending they’re engaging in space warfare as he listens to yoongi’s exasperated laughter from the co-pilot’s chair. then yoongi shows him how to use some contraxian gun he has on board—it’s proper futuristic-looking, more of a blaster that shoots out what looks like a ball of electricity than anything. yoongi refuses to shoot him, even though jeongguk tells him to do it just to see what it feels like.
jeongguk lets yoongi try on the spider-man suit. it fits him surprisingly well—although jeongguk figures it’s because the material is meant to accommodate whoever is wearing it, not because it’s perfectly tailored to jeongguk’s body. it feels strange to see someone else wearing his suit, and almost sends him into a downward spiral remembering the day in the trees, the other spider-men attacking him, seokjin sacrificing himself—but yoongi accidentally shoots a ball of webbing that ricochets off the wall of the ship and smacks him in the face, effectively pulling jeongguk from his thoughts and leaving him laughing so hard that he almost starts crying.
they laugh, they talk. it’s a good distraction from the truth of what is going to happen—the truth that this might be a hopeless endeavour, the truth that seokjin is still dead back on earth. but jeongguk refuses to believe that he has to live in a world without seokjin, and if he thinks too long on any of it, he’ll be paralyzed with it all: with the sadness, and the pain. so it’s easier to distract himself, to laugh at yoongi, to pretend that this is something fun and not a last-ditch effort to save seokjin, and himself, and maybe the whole world.
maybe everyone else can move on. maybe everyone else will. but jeongguk can’t—won’t. he has to do this.
it takes until that night, then, for the distractions to finally cease. there’s no sunlight out here to alert them to nighttime, but jeongguk begins to yawn anyway, trying to stay awake as yoongi tells him a story about some of the adventures he’s been on in this ship. finally, he concedes that he has to sleep, slipping into one of two beds that the ship has near the back, nothing but little pods that contain a mattress and blankets.
the warmth of the day dissipates as soon as his head hits the pillow, staring up at the metal roof above the pod. without yoongi there to distract him, to keep him entertained, jeongguk has time to think. and he thinks of seokjin, of what seokjin might say to him now. he thinks of how he always begged seokjin to let him get on a space ship, to go to a different planet—maybe just asgard, maybe to visit hoseok. and seokjin always said, “i thought you wanted to be a friendly neighbourhood spider-man. how can you do that when you’re flying around space?” and maybe he had a point. but jeongguk still thinks he’d laugh knowing the reason jeongguk never went to the space was because of seokjin—and now the reason he is going to space is because of seokjin, too.
but he thinks, too, of the few conversations they had about the possibility of something happening to seokjin. being iron man meant he was in constant danger, and there were close calls more than once. they weren’t serious with each other often, only when it counted—but these times, it did. jeongguk would try to keep his emotions at bay, asking what he was supposed to do without seokjin, if something ever were to happen.
and seokjin would say, “you keep being spider-man. you keep being you. this world is still yours to defend even without me.” and he thinks—maybe seokjin wouldn’t want this. maybe he wouldn’t want jeongguk to try so hard to bring him back, even if it wasn’t the right time or place for him to die. but jeongguk is looking forward to seokjin telling him that himself, when jeongguk comes back with the soul stone and raises him from the dead.
inevitably, he feels the weight pressing on his chest—the numbness, the aching loneliness. he misses seokjin. for over a week, he hasn’t allowed himself to think of it, hasn’t let himself dwell. but there’s nothing to stop it now, to hold it back. he misses seokjin, even his scolding and lectures. he misses knowing seokjin was right there, just a call away. he misses—jeongguk sucks in a breath, realizing only now that his eyes are filled with tears, and he quickly wipes them away. he doesn’t want that here—he wants to be strong, like seokjin. he wants to be determined, like seokjin. he wants to stand in the face of adversity and death and pain and tell it to fuck off, like seokjin.
but in that moment, as all of it overwhelms him and the tears just come hotter and faster, jeongguk realizes he isn’t seokjin. he’s just a kid from seoul, a boy playing dress-up in a superhero suit. he doesn’t know what he’s doing.
yoongi finds him like that, not five minutes later. jeongguk has been trying not to make any noise, but he can’t help the little gasps he lets out as he inhales through his tears. and then yoongi is there, crawling into the pod with him, wrapping him up tightly in his arms. he doesn’t even ask what jeongguk needs—he just knows. and jeongguk realizes, as he clings to yoongi’s shirt, that yoongi has been doing that for a long time: just knowing, taking care of jeongguk in all of the small ways. he’s only been here for a few months, but he’s picked up on everything that jeongguk likes and needs, weaving his care into each small action he does for jeongguk.
time wanes as jeongguk cries, and then eventually cries himself out, eyes droopy and swollen. he’s exhausted with it, calming down into sniffles and puffs of hot breath against yoongi’s neck before he finally pulls himself away enough to wipe at his wet face. “sorry,” he whispers.
“you have nothing to apologize for,” yoongi tells him, using his own hand to wipe at jeongguk’s tears. “do you wanna talk about it?”
“i dunno,” sniffs jeongguk, wiping at his nose before he lets his head rest on yoongi’s shoulder again. “i know we’re going to vormir to save hyung, but it still hurts. i miss him a lot.”
yoongi runs a hand through jeongguk’s hair, smoothing it down. “is there anything i can do?”
here, jeongguk sighs. here, he realizes that the answer is nothing—not because it’s impossible to comfort him, but because yoongi is already doing everything right. it’s just yoongi that makes everything better, having him here, holding jeongguk. they’re in the middle of the universe, flying off to a place unknown, and jeongguk has left behind everything he knows. but he still feels safe here, right at home. because somehow, yoongi is his home.
“stay with me?” he asks instead, turning his head to look up at yoongi imploringly. and yoongi grins, half red as always. half here, half there. but all jeongguk’s.
“of course,” he says. “want me to tell you a story?”
“yeah,” sighs jeongguk, cramming himself back into yoongi’s space. “tell me about contraxia.”
yoongi does. and somewhere between lyrical descriptions of rolling hills cast in pink light and hushed lullabies sung by parents to their sleeping babies, jeongguk falls asleep to the low timbre of yoongi’s voice. the last coherent thought he has is that yoongi sounds so, so sad.
✴ ✴ ✴
the second day feels mellow. jeongguk feels no need to laugh or play, instead sitting next to one of the side windows on the ship and watching the stars pass in nothing but streaks of light. eventually, yoongi joins him with food, silently begging for him to eat, and this time, jeongguk takes it, offering a word of thanks.
they sit and look out together. jeongguk can’t help wondering what yoongi is thinking, knowing he’s racing across the universe with a human who simply can’t let go of someone who has died. surely he thinks it’s silly. but yoongi willingly offered himself and has been for months. when jeongguk looks at him now, he thinks yoongi might just be a miracle.
“what are you gonna do when we get back?” yoongi asks suddenly, turning to look at him.
jeongguk’s brows furrow, swallowing his food. “i’m gonna use the soul stone to bring seokjin-hyung back.”
“yeah, obviously,” laughs yoongi. “i mean after that. what happens next?”
he realizes he hasn’t thought about it. “i guess the world will go into meltdown having iron man back,” he says. “i’ll want to talk to him, be with him a lot… god, he’ll get sick of me hanging around. but i think he’ll be happy, too.” seokjin always joked about how he would die—he would have to go out with a bang, some grand spectacle. he seemed to know he would die as iron man, never living to an old age, but he didn’t get the ending he deserved. it’s up to jeongguk to make that right.
“i need specifics here, bug boy,” says yoongi.
“why?”
“i’m just curious. what to superheroes do after they save the day?”
“we usually go for lunch, to be honest,” shrugs jeongguk. “so we’ll do that. you and me and seokjin-hyung, if he’s up for it. maybe… indian? honestly, i’m kind of craving curry right now.”
yoongi snorts, leaning his head against the glass of the window. “what else?”
“hm. i should probably go to class since i’ve basically been skipping for a week, not to mention i’ll have missed this coming week, too… but the professors understand. if i ever miss a class, i tell them it was official avengers business and they get all starry-eyed and let it go.”
“even when you just didn’t feel like waking up on time?”
“i would never,” says jeongguk, knocking his foot against yoongi’s ankle. but he’s grinning, anyway. “that new zombie movie is coming out this week, too. so we should go see that, and buy lots of popcorn. oh, and one of my classmates has been trying to convince me to come to this anime con thing that’s going on in a few weeks. normally, i try to keep my obsession under wraps, but we could probably go.” after a second, he gasps, staring at yoongi. “oh my god, you could cosplay todoroki.”
yoongi’s grin is soft, careful, tinged with something that aches. “only if i can somehow shoot fire and ice out of my hands.”
“flamethrower?” asks jeongguk. “i don’t know if i would trust you with that.”
“whatever.”
“i could show up as spider-man and people would love it. even if it’s not an anime thing. like, if i just show up in places in my suit, everyone goes nuts.”
“what about your spider-man things?” asks yoongi. “what kind of crime-fighting shenanigans will you get up to?”
“depends what the city needs, i guess,” shrugs jeongguk. “this time of year can be bad for muggings, since it’s getting warmer so people can usually snatch things and run away faster, i guess. we’ll have to hang out in back alleys more. maybe we can use some of your contraxian technology to catch them, too. we can be a team.”
yoongi has closed his eyes, still leaning against the window. for the first time since they set foot on this ship, he looks at peace. “that sounds nice,” he murmurs. “i’d like that.”
“it’ll be so cool,” sighs jeongguk. “i could give you a superhero name, too. we could be famous.”
he thinks maybe yoongi has fallen asleep—he breathes so softly, looks so untroubled. but then yoongi asks, “what would you do if you could live forever?”
jeongguk looks at him, just for a second. at his long hair cascading over his shoulders, tucked behind one of his ears. at his round nose, at his pink lips. jeongguk realizes yoongi is wearing one of his hoodies, one with an iron man mask printed on the front. he wonders, briefly, if yoongi misses home—his first home, his real home. wonders why he was so ready to give everything up to come to earth and stay. wonders if he was running from something, or if he merely found something on earth that he wanted more than what he had on contraxia.
“i don’t know,” jeongguk admits. “forever is a long time.”
“i’d visit every planet in the entire universe,” says yoongi. “even the dangerous ones, even the ones no one wants to go to. i’d see the people, learn the languages. i’d leave a bit of myself behind everywhere i went, but take a bit of that place with me, too, to keep with me. until i was made up of every corner of the universe so all of it could live forever, too.”
“it sounds like you’ve thought about it.”
yoongi just shrugs. “i used to read about other galaxies all of the time,” he says. “i memorized as much as i could about them, just in case i ever met someone from a different planet. i wanted to know everything.” he opens his eyes slowly, looking out of the window rather than at jeongguk. and there it is again—that sad tilt to his lips, the sad pinch in his forehead. “there’s so much more i wanted to know.”
“you still have time, yoongi,” says jeongguk. “even if you can’t live forever, you can still go to other planets. you don’t have to stay on earth when we get back.”
yoongi’s eyes move to his. “that’s not what i’m saying, jeongguk,” he says. “i’m going to stay with you however i can.”
“i just don’t want you to feel like you have to. just because we’re—” he pauses on the word friend. are they friends? are they something more? yoongi—holds him, holds his hand. yoongi has kissed him through nothing but a silly little mask. but they haven’t talked about it and now feels like a bad time for it. so he says, “just because we’re close.”
now yoongi grins, tapping his foot against jeongguk’s. “you’re a good kid, you know that?”
“i’m being serious.”
“i know,” sighs yoongi. “but i’m staying with you for as long as i can.”
jeongguk grins, nodding. suddenly, he’s looking forward to more than just having seokjin back. he wants more with yoongi, too, wants to learn more, wants to know more. wants to be brave enough to say something about the strange rolling of feelings inside of him, slowly untangling the longer he sits here and realizes maybe there’s something more. maybe there always has been, and it’s simply taken him this long to realize it. maybe there’s no one else he would rather be stuck in a spaceship with, trusting with everything within him.
“min yoongi,” he says. “i like you very, very much.”
and yoongi grins at him, mellow. melancholy. “as you should, jeon jeongguk. as you fucking should.”
✴ ✴ ✴
the next morning, jeongguk wakes to yoongi shaking him, telling him that they’re not far from vormir. suddenly, he’s filled with more than he can handle—excitement and anticipation, but fear and worry, too. he has no idea what they’ll come across or how easy it’ll be to actually find the stone. will they have to comb the entire planet to find it? will they have to answer riddles or fight monsters?
whatever it is, he knows, he’ll do it. it’s for seokjin. for iron man.
he changes into his spider-man suit to be prepared, rushing into the cockpit to find yoongi sitting in the pilot’s chair. they may be close, but all he sees is stars and no planets, slightly disappointed when they’re not ready to immediately jump out of the ship and get to searching.
“i didn’t mean that close,” says yoongi when jeongguk starts complaining. “within the hour, probably. i have to make sure we’ll have a safe landing anyway.”
jeongguk takes to wandering the ship, cleaning things up and making sure they’re ready for an arrival. but within minutes, he’s antsy, wanting to be on the planet and looking for the stone now. now that they’re this close, he can hardly wait another moment. but he doesn’t want to bother yoongi with it, knowing that it’ll get exasperating. he takes to stretching, doing push-ups and sit ups, trying to burn off some of his energy.
he takes to making sure his web fluid is working, testing out a few web options in the back of the ship. eventually, he just starts climbing the walls, trying to distract himself as time slowly ticks down. he crawls on the ceiling into the cock pit, sticking by the pads of his fingers and his knees as he looks down at yoongi.
eventually, yoongi looks up and startles. “fucking hell,” he says. “don’t do that.”
“sorry,” says jeongguk. “are we there yet?”
“almost. we should talk about what we’re going to do once we’re there.”
rather than come down like a normal person, jeongguk attaches a web to the ceiling and slides down upside down. he stops beside yoongi’s chair, grinning when yoongi turns his head to find jeongguk is right there, the wrong side up. it reminds him, suddenly, of the day in the park, the first time he did this with yoongi. he remembers, too, that yoongi kissed him like that, over the mask—the mask that jeongguk is now wearing, concealing the grin he wears.
“weirdo,” sighs yoongi, flicking his forehead.
“i already know what we’re doing,” says jeongguk. “we’re going to find the soul stone and get the heck back home.”
“not everything is that easy, jeongguk,” says yoongi. “you would do well to remember that. it’s good to have a plan.”
“like what?”
“we stick together,” says yoongi, sitting back in his chair and watching jeongguk, who is still hanging upside down. “i’m the one who knows more about this planet and the stone, so you have to listen to me, okay? if i tell you to do something, you have to do it.”
yoongi’s face is serious and earnest, and jeongguk realizes for the first time that this isn’t going to be walking onto the planet and leaving again. this might be real work, might have real danger—and yoongi isn’t joking around about it. he’s making sure jeongguk understands, trying to be completely serious.
jeongguk stops grinning. he nods. “okay.”
“even if i tell you to run,” says yoongi. “even if i tell you to leave without me.”
“what?” asks jeongguk. “why would i leave without you?”
“jeongguk, you have to promise.”
“i’m not going to leave you there!”
“jeongguk.”
“that’s stupid.”
“it’s just in case,” says yoongi, exasperated. “i’m just saying that we might come across something we don’t like, and if we do, we have to be prepared. i just want you to be prepared.”
swallowing tightly, jeongguk stares at yoongi through the mask. maybe he can finally begin to understand the pained look on his face, the one he’s worn when he thinks jeongguk isn’t looking—maybe yoongi knows more than he’s letting on about what they’ll face. but either way, jeongguk knows he’s right. even if the planet is barren, there might be life on it, or some sort of creature. anyone who knows the location of the planet could be there, could want to hurt them for trying to take the soul stone. and even if jeongguk is the superhero, he’s still out of his element on a different planet.
“i can protect you,” he says quietly. “i have this suit for a reason.”
“you can protect me,” says yoongi. “but if it comes down to it, i want you to promise me that you’ll listen to me.”
he doesn’t want to. he doesn’t want to, because leaving yoongi behind is the coward’s way out. and yet—he knows yoongi won’t land the ship on vormir if he doesn’t get jeongguk’s agreement. even if jeongguk doesn’t plan on keeping the promise, he still has to make it.
so—“fine,” he says. “i’ll leave you behind if you tell me to, as stupid as i think that is.”
“thank you,” says yoongi.
there’s a tense moment of silence, and then jeongguk says, “i still don’t think we’ll have to worry about it,” and yoongi lets out a huffed laugh, dropping his head into his hands.
“you are insufferable, bug boy.”
“thank you.”
“it wasn’t a compliment.”
“i know.”
yoongi lifts his head and looks at jeongguk, this time with a tiny grin on his lips. and then it fades, just slowly. and jeongguk has no idea what is coming next, but he’s afraid of it—and still feels safe with yoongi. he always feels safe with yoongi, feels as though no matter what happens, it’ll be okay because it’s yoongi. they have no choice but to be alright.
carefully, yoongi leans over the side of his chair until his face is just inches from jeongguk’s, mismatched as always. he taps his finger against jeongguk’s cheek as he says, “you know, i’m really glad i came to earth. i’m glad i got to know you, jeon jeongguk.”
“you’re not so bad yourself, you know,” says jeongguk, suddenly afraid of being vulnerable. even under the mask, he’s afraid that yoongi will know—can tell that his cheeks are reddening, can understand all of these things he’s been realizing about his own feelings over the past few days. but maybe yoongi already knows. maybe he always has.
“i’m glad i got to be with you,” says yoongi. “i’m glad you let me in. i wouldn’t have wanted to be on earth with anyone else. i wouldn’t have wanted to travel the universe with anyone else.”
“why are you talking like this is it?”
rather than answer, yoongi runs his thumb over jeongguk’s mouth, pressing into his lips. “remember the park?” he asks, and jeongguk does—remembers it too well. it was just the moment before he had to rush off to save seokjin. the moment before he failed, before he let seokjin die.
jeongguk’s breath comes out hot and shallow, a shaky sigh. “yeah,” he whispers. he’s been upside down for so long that the blood has rushed to his head, making it pound. he sways, feeling as though he could fall any moment, but yoongi is right here, watching him so, so carefully, touching his face like that. and jeongguk’s stomach clenches with anticipation, refusing to break it, wanting it to go on forever and ever.
it’s in that moment, when yoongi whispers, “maybe we should try it again,” that jeongguk realizes he more than likes yoongi. he can’t put it to words just yet. but he wants. he wants.
he breathes out again, still shaky. “maybe we should try it without the mask this time,” he replies. he thinks—maybe. he thinks—he has no idea what will happen, but this feels like their last chance, feels like everything has been leading to this one moment. to yoongi sliding his fingers over jeongguk’s chin, over his neck, until he finds where the mask connects with the rest of his suit, and gently begins rolling it down.
he rolls the mask over jeongguk’s chin, then his bottom lip, then his top. then he keeps going, until he can pull the mask off entirely, letting it fall to the ground below. there’s nothing between them now, just yoongi’s hazy eyes watching him, jeongguk’s heart lodging itself in his throat. and just like the first time, yoongi starts at his forehead. just a soft kiss there, hands sliding to hold the sides of jeongguk’s head. then between his eyes, the tip of his nose.
jeongguk’s breath hitches as yoongi’s lips move closer and closer, brushing over jeongguk’s cupid’s bow and his top lip, and then—then yoongi kisses him. kisses him with nothing in between, kisses him with all of the stars behind it, like he’s been waiting and wanting for months.
and jeongguk kisses him back. they’re mismatched, wrong fundamentally—but it makes sense. it makes sense to have it like this, as they’ve always been. a human and an alien, a superhero and a pilot. yoongi’s lips are soft over his own, pressing gently before he presses a little harder, moving his mouth over jeongguk’s. jeongguk realizes, with a thrill shooting up his spine, that he would promise yoongi anything as long as he gets this just one more time.
it seems as though hours pass before yoongi pulls away, breathing hotly against jeongguk’s lips. they should talk about it, maybe. they’re about to head into the unknown and they should talk about it, there are so many things he wants to say, and yoongi presses a thumb into the corner of jeongguk’s lips, brushing his own against them again.
he whispers, “jeongguk—”
and then something beeps loudly, jolting the both of them away from each other. jeongguk’s head snaps toward the console, confused, before he sees—a planet. a planet right there in front of them, the ship slowing off of auto-pilot.
jeongguk’s stomach clenches. it’s vormir.
✴ ✴ ✴
a rocky mountain looms before them, cast in shadow and darkness as is the rest of the planet; nothing but ominous purple and red light illuminates the treacherous ground. it feels right, though, for a place holding such a powerful stone, to look like this. the planet appears entirely uninhabited, and jeongguk finds himself reaching for yoongi’s hand as they look up at the mountain.
“it’s there?” he asks.
yoongi nods. “i think so.” they’ve taken few supplies with them; jeongguk has his spider-man suit, equipped with weapons and survival supplies should they need anything. yoongi tucked one of the hand-held blasters from the ship into his pants, prepared for whatever might come next. they’ve already come this far, soaring across the universe with only hope fueling them—jeongguk refuses to go back to earth without the soul stone. he has to bring seokjin back and make it right.
they climb the mountain in silence, attached only by the hand as they pick their way up the rocky path. jeongguk has never been afraid of heights, but there’s something about this particular situation that leaves him on edge as they move upward slowly. the higher they go, the more uneasy jeongguk feels, knowing there has to be some catch to all this. he can’t expect the stone to simply be sitting atop the mountain, waiting for them to take it. there has to be a riddle, a game to play. he has no idea what it is, but surely yoongi must have heard something in all of those rumours about vormir.
there has to be something he’s not telling jeongguk.
at last, they reach the summit, jeongguk tightening his hold on yoongi’s hand to keep him from wandering as suddenly—a figure wearing a dark cloak appears before them. jeongguk immediately shoots his wrist out, prepared to detain the figure, but yoongi stops him with a hand on his arm, pushing it down with a quick shake of his head. still, jeongguk is on the defensive, high strung as the figure approaches to reveal a man—or something like it—with bright red skin, hardly more than a skull with eyes.
“welcome,” says the man, voice echoing around them, “jeongguk, son of minyoung.” jeongguk startles, raising his arm again when he realizes this stranger knows who he is. he turns to yoongi, then, and speaks words in a language that jeongguk couldn’t hope to replicate, a tangle of syllables that jeongguk realizes must be yoongi’s actual name—not just the korean one he chose to go by while on earth.
“who are you?” jeongguk demands. “how do you know who we are?”
the stranger seems less than perturbed with jeongguk’s crass attitude, leveling him with an almost kind look. everything about this seems wrong, and jeongguk wonders if they must defeat this man for the stone—if he guards it, keeps it safe. “you can think of me as a guide,” he says. “i am cursed to know all who seek the soul stone.”
“so you know where it is?” asks jeongguk. “do you guard it?”
“nothing guards the stone,” says the man. “you may wish to defeat me, but it will do you no good. i bear no ill will toward you. i am no obstacle.”
jeongguk narrows his eyes, and then glances at yoongi, who appears less confused about the situation. but he doesn’t say anything, so jeongguk turns back to man and says, “guide us, then. take us to the soul stone.”
the walk is silent. the stranger, who gives them no name to call him by, turns and leads them over the top of the mountain. it’s flat and rocky, providing a view of the barren planet below them—miles and miles of rocky ground and nothing more. jeongguk doesn’t think this planet could sustain life for even a day, and although he burns with curiosity about their guide, he holds his tongue. suddenly, everything feels—heavy. the weight of what they must do comes to him, now, knowing that in only a few short moments, he and yoongi will be in possession of one of the infinity stones, perhaps the most dangerous of all of them.
but it’s for seokjin. jeongguk would scour the universe for every single infinity stone if it meant seeing seokjin alive again.
finally, they come to a stop at the end of the mountain, where it suddenly drops off into a cliff. two massive stone pillars rise out of the ground before it, a semi-circle carved into the rock acting as some sort of platform. this was made for the stone, jeongguk realizes, and he slowly walks to the edge of the cliff, looking down at the cluster of jagged rocks below.
but no stone.
he turns around, about to question, when the stranger speaks again: “what you seek lies before you, as does what you fear.”
“that’s cryptic,” says jeongguk. “where is it? how do we get it? we’re kind of in a hurry.”
across the platform, yoongi’s eyes meet his. and they’re—so filled with sorrow that it almost knocks jeongguk off of his feet.
“how do you acquire the stone, you ask?” says the stranger. “you cannot merely take it, son of minyoung. the stone demands a sacrifice.” jeongguk’s brows furrow, turning to look back over the cliff. a sacrifice. “in order to take the stone, you must lose that which you love. a soul for a soul.”
jeongguk stares down at the jagged rocks, hundreds of feet away. the stone demands a sacrifice—a sacrifice of love. an exchange.
and all at once—jeongguk understands.
“no,” he says, head snapping back to look at yoongi, eyes wide. “yoongi, no.”
“if you want the stone, you have to play by the rules,” he says, finally, voice hollow. “you heard him.”
“what the fuck,” breathes jeongguk, immediately hurrying away from the edge of the cliff now that he understands. if jeongguk wants the soul stone, wants to bring back seokjin, he has to sacrifice something. he has to sacrifice someone he loves. and his eyes turn to—“yoongi, we can’t do that. there has to be another way.”
“there is no other way,” says the man. “the soul stone contains unimaginable power. only those who truly understand what they are seeking may find the stone. only those who understand what they must give up for that power are worthy of gaining it.”
“are you hearing yourself?” snaps jeongguk. “you want one of us to just—just throw the other over the side of that cliff?”
“it is you who seek the stone, not i.”
suddenly, he can’t breathe. suddenly, everything is wrong and too much and it hurts. he wanted an easy out of this. he wanted the universe to agree that seokjin shouldn’t have died, and now he’s supposed to sacrifice someone he loves. he’s supposed to sacrifice yoongi for seokjin, an exchange that could never stop hurting him. could never stop haunting him—it was his fault that seokjin died, but now it’ll be his fault that yoongi dies, he can’t—he can’t—
“jeongguk, you’re hyperventilating,” says yoongi, and he’s right there, right at his side, taking jeongguk’s shoulders into his hands. “breathe for me, okay? calm down.”
“i can’t,” jeongguk chokes out, a hand rising to his mouth. “we can’t do this.” he looks up, looks into yoongi’s eyes—sees this beautiful and otherworldly being that he’s gotten to know over the past few months, someone who has cared for him through the hardest week of his life, who is kind and funny and curious, and it’s only now, realizing that that he might lose him, that jeongguk realizes it’s the perfect trap. because jeongguk does love yoongi. and the only way he can gain seokjin is to lose yoongi.
and then he realizes—maybe that’s not the only option.
“i don’t want this,” he whispers. “we have to go home.”
yoongi’s eyes are so sad. they’ve always been expressive, since that first moment they met—they’ve been bright and wide and happy, filled with mirth and love and hope. but now, there’s a sea of pain in them. “remember what you told me a few days ago?” he asks. “you said, earth needs iron man. and you’re right. we came here because we both know that we can’t just let him be dead. and if this is what it takes, then so be it. jeongguk, so be it. this isn’t about us anymore—it’s about everyone. it’s about your home. it’s about seokjin.”
he’s earnest, honest. yoongi still can’t understand what iron man means to earth, but he’s so adamant about it in a way that scares jeongguk. “it’s not worth it,” he whispers. “not if we have to die.”
“only one of us has to, jeongguk,” says yoongi. “only one of us has to sacrifice something. and it’ll be a noble sacrifice—this is our chance to be something more. to save earth. to do good by everyone who looks up to the avengers, to others to protect them. isn’t that what you’ve always wanted to do? isn’t that what seokjin would do?”
and oh—oh. yoongi is all too clever. he knows so much about jeongguk, about his philosophies and desires. he knows that jeongguk loves being spider-man right in seoul, loves fighting petty crime and being a helping hand around the neighbourhood. but he also knows that jeongguk has spent his entire life waiting for an opportunity like this: to be something more, to prove that he belongs.
and suddenly, jeongguk realizes that yoongi is right.
they came all the way here with one purpose, and they can’t stop now. if the stone demands a sacrifice, then the stone will get a sacrifice.
jeongguk takes a deep breath, trying to calm his racing heart. he wipes at his eyes in case of tears, and takes a small step back from yoongi. “okay,” he says. “okay. i’ll do it.”
yoongi blinks. “do what?”
“sacrifice myself,” says jeongguk. “that’s what you were talking about, right?”
“no,” and yoongi steps forward, grabbing his shoulders again. “oh my god, jeongguk, no. i was talking about me.”
“why would you do it?” asks jeongguk. “you’re not even—you’re not from earth! why would you waste your life like that? you have a home to go back to. you can’t give up your life for some human.”
“i’m not going to let you die,” argues yoongi.
“what makes you think i’d let you die?” jeongguk shakes yoongi’s hands off of him, taking a step backwards—a step toward the edge of the cliff. he’s set on it now, suddenly—if this is what it takes, then so be it. and yoongi is right, after all: jeongguk has been waiting his whole life to do something like this. he’s not just spider-man, not anymore. and he needs seokjin back, but the truth is that earth needs iron man even without jeongguk. this isn’t a selfish endeavor; earth needs their hero. earth needs their avenger.
earth needs iron man more than it needs jeongguk.
“jeongguk, stop,” snaps yoongi, lunging for him again, but jeongguk takes a quick step backward, then another and another. “jeongguk, i’m serious. you’re not going to throw yourself over that cliff.”
“i have to!” he protests. “i have to do it for seokjin-hyung! this is my fight, yoongi. i’m the one who let him die, so i’m the one who has to save him, too.”
“how are you saving him by dying? you need to go back to earth and bring him back. you need to work with him. jeongguk, you’re—you’re spider-man. i’m just a random fucking alien who decided to hang out on earth for a while.”
“don’t you dare say that means you matter less than me,” says jeongguk. “don’t you dare. you—you are everything to me. and i can’t let you die. i refuse to go back without you.”
“so you’ll make me go back without you?”
“just let me do this!” jeongguk shouts, finally coming to a stop. he turns over his shoulder, seeing the edge of the cliff only ten feet from him. he turns back to yoongi, feeling the desperation claw itself up his throat now, more painful than before. yoongi has his hands held out to jeongguk like he’s a wild animal, like somehow he can convince him to come back with that alone. “i have to do this, yoongi! i can save both of you. even if it means i’m not there to see it, but that’s—that’s worth it.”
“please, jeongguk,” says yoongi, holding out his hand. he wiggles his fingers a little, like that alone can make jeongguk come back. (it almost does—that’s the thing. it almost does.) he’s stuck between a rock and a hard place, knowing that to gain seokjin means to lose his own life. and he did want seokjin back, but having seokjin back even if jeongguk isn’t there to see it is better than losing yoongi. he could never pit them against each other, but suddenly, he’s filled with all of this stupid love looking at yoongi.
because he can’t lose yoongi. the idea of having to go back home without him, to leave him here forever, is too much for jeongguk to bear. yoongi landed in his life so suddenly, yet it took this long for jeongguk to realize that there’s always been something more there. somewhere between swinging around the city with yoongi at his side and cramming into his bed to watch anime together, yoongi managed to take just a piece of jeongguk’s heart. and oh, he realizes. oh. this could work so well, because yoongi loves him, too, doesn’t he? he has—he always has. he’s taken care of jeongguk, has been enamored and enraptured by him from the very moment they met.
jeongguk used to think that maybe all contraxians just had those stars in their eyes, were just naturally caring and attentive. thought maybe they all liked holding hands and taking care of other people. and maybe they do—but if jeongguk thinks about it, yoongi’s love and care has always been directed at him.
because yoongi loves him.
and if jeongguk throws himself over the side of that cliff, yoongi can go back to earth and bring back seokjin. the world will have iron man and yoongi—the only perfect combination jeongguk can think of. both of them will pay the price, but only one will be alive long enough to feel it. and if jeongguk has to take himself out of the equation, then it’s worth it. it’s worth it to know that the two people he loves most will still be around, even if it hurts them.
they’ll get over it, won’t they? they’ll be happy one day. just that thought—it’s enough for him.
“i’m sorry,” says jeongguk. “tell seokjin-hyung to name his kids after me, okay?”
“jeongg—” but jeongguk is already moving, turning on his heel and running for the edge of the cliff. he closes his eyes, taking a breath and realizing this is it, this is it, and he opens his eyes as he’s one step from the edge, foot hitting the ground as he prepares to spring off of it, and—he’s suddenly thrown sideways as something collides with his side, crying out at an electric pain that runs through him. he lands on the ground with a painful thud, turning wild eyes to see yoongi sliding the blaster gun he brought back into his waistband and then—running for the edge.
“yoongi, no!” jeongguk yells, ignoring the pain in his side and immediately getting up. he wastes no time in pointing his wrist at yoongi, shooting a web out that attaches to his back and yanking it toward him. it brings yoongi with it, landing on the ground in a heap. jeongguk cuts the web immediately, leaping over yoongi only to feel a hand on his ankle, forcing him back down as he lands in his hands and knees.
“let go of me,” he snaps, trying to twist his ankle out of yoongi’s grip.
“not if you’re going to fucking throw yourself over the edge!” yoongi yells back.
“let me do this, yoongi. i’m not letting you die.”
“you’re not letting me if i want it,” says yoongi. “this won’t be your fault, jeongguk. i’m choosing it.”
jeongguk lets out a cry of frustration, beating his fist against the ground. then, all at once, yoongi is letting go—but only so he can crawl up jeongguk’s body, turning him over until they’re face to face. and jeongguk is tired. he’s so fucking tired.
yoongi takes jeongguk’s face into his hands. “for you, jeon jeongguk,” he whispers, “i would choose this a thousand times.” and then he leans down, jeongguk’s breath hitching, and presses a gentle kiss to jeongguk’s forehead.
jeongguk closes his eyes, feeling tears well in them. and he doesn’t get time to react before yoongi is gone, up and racing toward the edge again. in a moment, jeongguk has rolled over, shouting as he pushes himself up and runs after yoongi, and yoongi reaches the edge, and he looks over his shoulder at jeongguk, and for the first time since beginning this voyage, he doesn’t look sad, and he leaps—
and jeongguk leaps after him, arms reaching out for yoongi desperately. they collide mid-air, yoongi twisting in his grip, and as they tumble through the air, jeongguk turns to look up at the rapidly widening gap between them and the edge of the cliff. he sticks his arm up, shooting a web that sticks to the top of the cliff, and snakes his hand around until he can feel yoongi’s arm, gripping onto it as they come to a stuttering halt halfway down the cliff, swinging until they bump against the rocky face.
jeongguk breathes hard, tightening his grip on yoongi’s wrist and making sure his web isn’t about to break. and now it’s just—the two of them dangling over the edge, and yoongi looking down at the ground, then back up at him, desperation on his face. tears in his eyes.
for several long seconds, neither of them says anything. they just breathe, staring at each other.
then yoongi says, “let go, jeongguk.”
“no,” says jeongguk, shaking his head. he has no means of wiping away the tears that immediately form in his eyes, threatening to spill within moments. “i won’t. i won’t lose you.”
“you have to let me go,” says yoongi. he’s not holding onto jeongguk, nothing but dead weight in jeongguk’s grip, but—jeongguk has done this before. he’s saved lives like this before, has held onto whole cars like this. he can do this forever, until yoongi finally gives up. he can wait. “you promised, remember? you have to bring seokjin back.”
“what use is gaining him but losing you?” asks jeongguk. “how is that better?”
“you’ll be happy, jeongguk,” nods yoongi. “one day. you’ll get to be with him, and you’ll forget about me, because i was just—just some weird alien you knew, who helped you save the fucking world.”
“no,” cries jeongguk—and he does cry, turning his face to the sky for a moment as the tears finally spill over onto his cheek. he can’t stop them, can’t do anything but hang there and grip onto yoongi’s wrist so tightly that he fears he might split his knuckles. he gasps in a breath, turning his face to look at yoongi again—to see the first tear slip from yoongi’s eyes too, marring that pretty face of his. “i’m not going to be happy, you dipshit! i love you, yoongi.”
“that’s why this is going to work,” whispers yoongi. “that’s why it’ll be worth it. and then you can go home and do all of those things you told me about, remember? all of those other adventures.”
jeongguk gasps in a breath, squeezing his eyes closed as the last few days flood through him again: the questions yoongi asked, wanting to imagine their future together, wanting to talk about his home and his life and his family. all of those sad looks he gave jeongguk, the way he looked out into space as though it was the last time he ever would. “oh god,” says jeongguk. “you knew all along, didn’t you?” he lets out a sob. “you fucking knew this would happen.”
“i’m sorry, jeongguk,” says yoongi, which is as good as a yes. “if i told you, i knew you wouldn’t have let us come.”
“why would you do that?”
“the world needs iron man, jeongguk,” says yoongi. “you said so yourself. he wasn’t supposed to die. it wasn’t his time, it wasn’t his place. but it was an accident, and it happened, and you can turn it back. you can change it, make it better. and you two can go on and make earth a better place like you always do. i can’t do that. what i can do is this.”
jeongguk growls, hand beginning to cramp around yoongi’s wrist. he tightens his hold, sniffing against a new onslaught of tears. “i don’t want that,” he says.
“the world needs you too, jeongguk,” whispers yoongi, and somehow, he sounds so calm. but of course he is—because he knew this was going to happen. he prepared for this. he’s been making his peace with it for days already, even if he’s crying now. somehow, he’s so pretty when he cries. “this isn’t your time or place. the world needs iron man, but it needs spider-man too. and you need him. and he needs you.”
“i need you,” cries jeongguk. “i need you, yoongi, please, god—” he’s shaking, suddenly, can’t stop. yoongi won’t listen to him. “why are you doing this? why don’t you think you’re worthy of living, too?”
“it’s not about that.” yoongi lifts his other hand, wiping at his own tears. and then he says what he said to jeongguk only days ago, when he was trying to comfort jeongguk over seokjin’s death: “that’s what people do when they love someone. they take care of them. sometimes that means making them soup when they’re sick. sometimes that means being honest with them when they’re being a shitty friend. and sometimes—” he pauses, voice wavering for the first time. yoongi closes his eyes, lips pressed together as new tears spill out from behind his closed lids.
jeongguk finishes it for him, barely more than a whisper: “sometimes it means sacrificing themselves to keep the person they love safe.”
“i love you, jeongguk,” says yoongi. “and you were the best adventure i could have asked for. but earth needs you. it will always need you—and him. and you will be happy. the world will be safe. that’s what we want, isn’t it?”
“yoongi, please,” jeongguk whispers, and it’s not fair, it’s not fair—his heart feels like it’s in a vice grip, tighter and tighter with each second, and there’s nothing he can do but he has to try, he has to try—“i don’t want to live in a world that has him and not you.”
“you know how to fly my ship,” says yoongi, and it sounds too much like a goodbye—“make sure they know it was me, okay? on contraxia.”
“yoongi.”
“and don’t forgot to go to class because you said you would—”
“yoongi—”
“and you know i love you, right?”
jeongguk stares at him. and yoongi grins, just a little, through the tears and the sweat and his perfect half-and-half hair fluttering in the wind behind him.
“i’m no—” a light streaks past jeongguk’s face, making him flinch so hard that he loses his grip on yoongi’s wrist and lets go, face turning toward the rock with a phantom heat and pain rippling through him. and then—in an instant, he realizes what he’s done, his hand empty, and looks down to see yoongi falling, falling, his gun in his hand—he shot past jeongguk’s head to make him let go, he forced it, and he’s falling, he’s going to hit the ground—
“yoongi!’ jeongguk screams, frantically letting go of his own web and diving down after yoongi. he points his arm downward and shoots a stringed web out, trying to catch him, and yoongi is still falling, watching him, hair flying out above him, and the web reaches down and down, not fast enough, it’s not fast enough—
finally, he sees it reach yoongi, latching onto his stomach, and jeongguk looks to the cliff face instead, spotting a few massive stones jutting out. at the last second, he reaches out for them, groaning as his hand catches on the stones and he comes to a jerking halt, arm nearly ripping out of its socket as he stops himself. only a second later, he feels the web connecting he and yoongi go taunt, and he looks down, seeing yoongi dangling from the end of his web dangerously close to the ground.
jeongguk breathes hard, attaching the end of the web to the rock before he lets go and jumps the rest of the way down, landing on the ground beside yoongi, and yoongi—isn’t moving.
he isn’t breathing.
there’s nothing but silence as jeongguk holds his own breath, staring at where the web has attached itself to yoongi’s body, and where yoongi’s body is arched into it, where his back is—curved so unnaturally, and jeongguk suddenly lets out a gasping breath, a fresh bout of tears coming to him as he cuts the end of the web and scoops up yoongi instead, carefully kneeling on the ground with yoongi in his arms.
“yoongi?” he asks, voice barely a whisper. his hand trembles over yoongi’s face, searching for any sign of life, any breath, any movement—“yoongi. hey—” he sucks in a breath, as it hits him all at once: understanding.
yoongi is dead.
“yoongi,” he whispers, carefully moving some of yoongi’s hair away from his face. “yoongi. look at me. please look at me.” he’s trembling, careful fingers moving onto yoongi’s face—tracing his eyebrows, his nose, his lips. he waits, he waits, but yoongi doesn’t take a breath. he doesn’t open his eyes.
“please,” he whispers, holding yoongi’s cheek. “stay with me, yoongi. stay with me. don’t do this to me.” his hand trails down yoongi’s chin to his neck, to his chest—which isn’t moving. his heart isn’t beating, there’s nothing and nothing and nothing, and jeongguk gasps in a breath, vision blurring so badly that he can’t see at all. he can’t keep himself from crying, hot tears slick over his cheeks as they drip onto yoongi’s jacket, soaking into the material, and still, yoongi doesn’t breathe.
he was too late. jeongguk was too late, always too fucking late—a trickle of blood seeps from yoongi’s nostril, and he must have hit the ground. jeongguk reached him, but he must have hit the ground first, and now he’s not breathing, and jeongguk lets out a sob that hurts his throat, hurts his chest, feels like ripping something out of his heart with his own two hands.
jeongguk tries to breathe, body wracked with trembling sobs as he lets his head fall until his forehead is resting against yoongi’s cheek. “no,” he says. “we were supposed to do all of that stuff together.” and he can see it—he can see them going home, bringing seokjin back. he can see them being together, properly, now that they know how they feel—and they would be happy.
they were supposed to be happy.
he lets out another sob, lifting his face away. “maybe,” he begins, barely more than a whisper, like a secret held between them—“maybe human spit has healing powers.” he almost laughs at his own joke, at something only yoongi understands, but yoongi—is dead. and jeongguk can’t bring himself to try it, thumb tugging at the corner of yoongi’s lips.
“just take me instead,” he whispers, turning his face up to look at the sky. far above them, on top of the cliff, the sky has changed—the clouds have gathered over the stone pillars, a hole appearing in the middle as it seems to suck all of the air through it. he lets out another sob, wiping at his eyes. “just take me instead! do you hear me? take me, you fucking—” he almost chokes on a sob, realizing it’s useless.
he lets out another shaky breath, closing his eyes are hot tears slip past his lids, onto his cheeks, onto yoongi. he holds yoongi closer, letting his head fall and rest against yoongi’s neck. darkness swims before him, grief overwhelming him as he realizes they’ve done it—they’ve given the sacrifice that the stone demands.
all at once, everything goes dark, all sensation pulled from jeongguk’s body, and he can’t feel yoongi anymore. when he opens his eyes again, he finds himself looking up at the sky—the same sky of vormir, purples and reds like lightning and clouds above him. he’s lying in a shallow pool of water, hand closed around something small and hard.
when he lifts his hand and opens it, he finds himself looking at a small orange gem: the soul stone.
✴ ✴ ✴
jeongguk wipes a thin layer of snow away from the top of the gravestone, cleaning off the sides and face of it. when he’s satisfied with how the stone looks, he takes a small step back, takes a deep breath—lets his hands fall to his side, thudding in the otherwise quiet cemetery. he shivers, wishing now that he had worn a thicker coat. he can almost hear yoongi’s voice scolding him for not dressing properly, since he was always concerned that jeongguk would get cold during the winter when he was wearing his spider suit.
he doesn’t—get cold, that is. but ever since the first snow fall, every time he tugs on the suit, jeongguk finds himself hesitating. sometimes he throws on a hoodie, just to be safe.
then jeongguk squats down in the snow, rubbing his hands together to keep them warm. the flowers he brought last time are still fresh, placed gently across the name carved into the stone—and he knows that min yoongi was never actually yoongi’s name. he heard it once, that true name of his, but could never hope to write it out. sometimes he wonders if yoongi’s family still wait for him to come home, if they wonder. if, somehow, they know; yoongi told jeongguk to make sure people knew it was him. and he has, to the best of his ability. but earth is so, so small, and so, so far from yoongi’s home. it’s never enough.
“hey,” he says, finally. his voice feels too loud in the silence of the cemetery, but when he looks sideways, he sees he is alone. sometimes it feels silly to do this—to speak to a grave, an empty grave. they had nothing to bury, but jeongguk insisted they buy the plot anyway, the headstone, insisted they mark a place for the contraxian who gave up his life in the hopes of earth gaining back its saviour. but every time he feels the embarrassment, he remembers those last days on the ship—remembers how yoongi had looked out at the stars as he asked jeongguk what would they do when they got home, all the while knowing he wouldn’t be going home.
it was this that gave him comfort: knowing jeongguk would go home and continue living. knowing that jeongguk would find ways to be happy. knowing that jeongguk would be able to do all of those things and more.
so, even in death, jeongguk hopes to give yoongi just a bit more comfort, a bit more hope—he comes here, and he tells yoongi all that he hopes for, all that he wants. all of his grand plans that yoongi will never get to be a part of but could have been—and is, anyway, even if it’s only because jeongguk tries his best to keep yoongi with him anyhow he can.
“i passed that statistics class that was giving me grief,” says jeongguk, pressing his hand to his nose to warm it. “not with flying colours, but it was good enough. i don’t have to take another mathematics class so long as i live, so that’s nice, at least. my classes for this semester are going well, too. you’re not here to tell me go to class, but it’s probably a good idea to finish my degree in case this bug boy thing doesn’t pan out.”
he grins at his own joke. no matter how many times he corrected yoongi about his real name, he’s grown fond of bug boy in yoongi’s absence. “yesterday, i witnessed this car accident,” he adds a second later. “i ran to help, but it was too late for, um—a few of the passengers. and it’s times like those when i feel so useless, like what’s the point of calling myself a superhero if i can’t save everyone? but i guess—” he sighs, breath creating a small cloud before him. he looks up at the sky, not wanting to see yoongi’s name as he says it—“i guess i can’t save everyone. and it’s not fair, but that doesn’t mean i’m not good at what i do. and that doesn’t mean i should just stop, because then a lot of other people could get hurt, too.”
jeongguk laughs. “took me a bit to figure that out,” he says. “i used to want to give it up because of—what happened. but if i gave up, then what did you sacrifice yourself for, you know? it’s okay to be sad and to mourn. and i’m still doing that, even though it’s been a few months. but in the end, you gave up your life so that i could keep mine and do good with it. and protect this planet. and make your death worth it.” he shrugs. “i’m still trying to figure out how to do that, but i think i’m doing okay.”
he sniffs, blaming it on the cold, but he wipes at his eyes just in case anyone is looking. just in case yoongi is looking, wherever he is. he’d probably tease jeongguk about all of this—the inspirational speeches, the flowers. but maybe he would like it, too. maybe he’d kiss jeongguk right between the eyes, tell jeongguk that he did good. tell jeongguk that he loves him, even if he’s part bug.
and that’s enough, at least for now.
yoongi died for jeongguk, so—jeongguk is going to live for yoongi. and one day, maybe he’ll learn to live for himself, too.
the sound of footsteps crunching on the snow draws jeongguk’s attention, head turning to see a familiar figure walking through the gravestones. as always, a sense of relief passes over him, and he turns back to yoongi’s gravestone before reaching down and beginning to draw patterns in the snow at his feet.
“we’re gonna go to contraxia,” he says, feeling oddly shy about it. “not right now, but hopefully soon. hyung got in contact with those delegates you traveled here with and told them about what happened, and they think it’s a good idea for us to visit. to tell everyone about you.” jeongguk grins now, finally feeling good about something. “it was my idea, obviously. when i’m finished this semester, hyung says i can go with him. so they’ll know what you did for us and remember you on contraxia, too. and they’ll know that you’re an avenger. the best one.”
the footsteps stop beside him, and jeongguk turns his head to look up at seokjin.
“taehyung is worried about your internal temperature,” says seokjin. jeongguk can’t help but snort, looking over his shoulder at the group of men at the edge of the cemetery. they insist on coming with him sometimes—most times. even if most of them didn’t actually know yoongi, they understand what he still means to jeongguk, what he did for all of them. but they always give jeongguk his space, his time. he’s grateful for it.
“is he going to try to force me to drink hot drinks for the rest of the day?” asks jeongguk, looking back to seokjin.
“or he’ll just cuddle you.”
“i can deal with that.”
seokjin grins down at him before winking. and jeongguk feels—just a spark of happiness. these days, he feels it a lot. and that doesn’t mean he’s not sad, or that he won’t continue to be sad for a long time. but he’s growing, healing, bit by bit. every time he comes here, he’s reminded why yoongi sacrificed himself in the first place, and feels a renewed determination to make it worth it. to make yoongi proud.
maybe that’s all he ever really wanted.
jeongguk finally stands up, brushing off his legs. seokjin’s arm wraps around his shoulders, tugging him in, and for long moments, they both stand there, looking at yoongi’s gravestone. it’s not quite easier, not yet—but it will be. jeongguk truly believes that.
eventually, seokjin gives jeongguk a squeeze and asks, “ready to go?”
no, he thinks. the answer is always no. he always wants to be where yoongi is, even if it’s just here. but that’s not fulfilling his promise to yoongi to keep going, to make all of this worth it. so he nods, giving yoongi’s gravestone one last, longing look before he lets seokjin lead him away, back across the silent, lonely cemetery, to those who are waiting for them. for him.
at the last second, he turns to look over his shoulder again, but he can no longer tell which gravestone in yoongi’s in the sea of white and grey before him. but that’s okay—because yoongi isn’t there, not really. he’s in the stars, a thousand different planets, where he always wanted to be. he’s here, in the group of avengers as they tug jeongguk close, making him laugh as they leave the cemetery. he’s there, every time jeongguk pulls on his mask, the constant reminder of why he does what he does.
he’s here, every time jeongguk steps onto a ledge, looking out at the city he calls home, the city he’s sworn to protect, even in the little things, when he hears yoongi’s voice, one of first things he ever said to jeongguk—take me to the sky, bug boy.
he did. he does.
he will.