\\ DUSK\\ Fantasy AU \ ATEEZ Fanfic

// Chapter 21 \\

Spitting, chaotic, waves were the only reminder that this eternal ocean was still wild and untamable. Crashing waves that could wash away clarity so blinding, it could reveal the truth, or hide it from the world.

They washed over Como. When he caved in on himself, when he had let go of the hold he had on those blue thick waters, when he gave into the harsh waves of eternal waters that engulfed him cruelly in the blink of an eye. Except I couldn't blink and I saw it all play out. The way Como disappeared and the mad dash of San as he ran straight towards me, laps and lashes of the unforgiving sea in his wake. He was desperate— that was a vivid glimmer of desperation in his eyes.

I quickly acted to yank myself back. I loved, but I also hated those eyes with their intent. What he wanted was not the same as what I wanted. So I moved as fast as shaken legs of terror could take me and I hoped my movements were as impulsive as they'd been when I left that pink mark across San's face. But they weren't.

I was too slow as San moved upon me, drawing his weapon back as he reached his other hand out to me. Not an attack, an offering.

My eyes widened in a clarity of perfect detail from him, but I was so blind. Those vivid folds of those irises that hid the clock, the light, and the chills. It was empty of something else. The mind which had painted itself of innocence before when I looked into them was now reckless and ruined, shrouded in darkness.

Then the echo of words in that mind which were so close to coming off broken.

I'm failing me. I'm failing you. I'm failing everyone. I am failing everything.

San's maddening voice— his thoughts— tumbled into my eyes as I looked into his eyes. And somehow he knew— I could feel the brush of his true mind welcoming my presence. It wasn't welcome though; it was a desperate last grasp.

Please, M—

There was a scream, a bellow of a light, lustrous voice I'd trusted, sounding more broken than the words that continued to echo in my mind before my eyes quickly crumbled them away.

And that's when I snapped out of the picture of his mind to the state in reality of what he was in. My eyes widened as I looked to San.

Fire engulfed his black robes, lashing for his face and skin with destructive intent. Such destructive intent San even recognized it as he gazed to the blaze upon him. His eyes concealed nothing of what he felt. They were wide, shocked in panic, and afraid. But all of this was only a glimpse as the waters of Eastern Court had finally caught up to him. And the glimpse of this I had of him was merely a glimpse as the waves crashed and washed over him and carried him into the blue and shredding white abyss.

I choked on a gasp as I watched him disappear. I knew there was only one person in the room who could send such a blaze upon him and knock San off his course of hurtling straight towards me: Hongjoong.

I tossed my head over to see Hongjoong looking at me, fire ablaze in his hands and his eyes wide in pale grey fear, tears streaking down his face. His face then contorted in pain as he screamed above the waves, "Star! Look out!"