Dream Is A Killer

Chapter Six

The night sky is filled with glittering stars, one is shining bigger and brighter in the middle, and Taemin smiles at it. "It's like you," he tells his friend, pointing a finger and closing an eye. "You outshine most people," he drops his hand back on his chest and turns to see the confused smile on Taeyong's face.

"Do I?"

"What star would I be?" He turns to the night sky again, and Taeyong hums.

"You'd be the moon." Taemin shifts his gaze to the crescent and blinks at it. "You won't shine on your own. But when you do, you turn to be something beautiful."

"What does that supposed to mean?" He turns to look at his friend again, but there's no one there, and the sky above them smashes into the ground so suddenly that Taemin shakes with it and rolls to the side a couple of times. When he opens his eyes again, there's blackness surrounding him that he can't even see anything, and a familiar coldness that makes his skin shiver. "Taeyong?" He whispers, mostly to himself, still hunched over the ground, but there is no answer, and the picture flashing in front of his eyes tells him exactly why.

🪐

There's chaos before there's silence reflecting the terror in people's eyes, and before any suggestions is offered as a solution, Kibum leans in to whisper in his ear. "Taemin has been reported missing." Minho's eyes widen and he turns to look at Kibum for a moment before a screen is presented in the middle showing the location Lady Ester was seen in the last time, only right now, a black hole is taking its place, sucking at everything surrounding it and growing even bigger in size. The only good thing they can think of, is how the whole area is nearly dead, with zero citizens nearby.

"Did he make a stupid decision?" He whispers back, but the look on Kibum's face when he turns is not pleasant at all.

"According to Jinki, a Choi ship took him away."

"Track it."

"Not possible," Kibum replies. "The signal completely vanished." And in a split second, the worry in Kibum's eyes settles like a heavy weight on Minho's shoulders as he turns slowly to look at the screen again.

Minho stands up, and heads turn his way. "If you'll excuse me, there's an urgent matter that I must attend to."

"More important than this?" One of the leaders scoffs at him.

"Do you know how to stop a black hole?" Minho questions, and the silence stretches around the table. "Figured." He turns to Kibum. "Let's go." And receives a nod in return.

🪐

Tiny specks of gold light his vision, but they're so far away for him to grasp with his hand. It's freezing, and the itching he feels to do something just keeps nagging at him. The specks keep increasing in size, and finally, the darkness around him starts to dissolve bit by bit. He notices that he's been lying down on a large field of golden sand, and his hand catches on a silk fabric beneath the surface. He tries to scatter the sand away, and a face comes in view making him pause and stare. It's one of the princesses, he knows that much, but she's pale and not breathing. Her eyes are empty yet reflecting the specks that grew in size as they approach. When Taemin turns to look the other way, the specks feel warm, like tiny stars settling by his side to keep him company.

He sits down next to the dead princess and places his palms up to gather more of the warmth, but every tiny spark dies in his hand and turns to black dust until the darkness starts to crawl back and he panics. "No, no, no ..." He looks around him, tries to find more of them, and when he dumps the black dust on the ground and tries to stand up, the beautiful yellow color that used to be there turns to black and he stumbles back on the ground, the freezing cold licking up his skin. He blinks, hand searching blindly for the body that was once by his side, but he comes in contact with nothing.