Work Text:
Ivan knew, as if the answer was spelled out by the flying cosmos, or in the white shirt of Till’s back as he ran away, that he loved the boy. Ivan knew, as he had known to breathe when he was born, that if millions love Till, then he is amongst those million. And if only one loves Till, then he is that one, and he is loving enough to cover for a billion people. And when they say no one loves Till, then he would have died by then, the moist ground wrapped around his body.
Ivan knew, even as Till runs back to Anakt Garden, that he loves the boy.
Ivan also knew, even as he sees Till running towards it, that Anakt Garden is an intricate grave. It is his tombstone, his casing before he is sent away back to the soil, the only mercy the aliens will ever have for him, if it can even be considered such. Anakt Garden is a cage that will send him to the soils, and the freedom is in the sky that they see now.
Ivan knows.
And yet, he runs.
Running had never pleased Ivan. At least, it no longer does, when humanity has fallen and they are naught but pets. Why run? When there’s nowhere else to go? Running was pointless.
And so when he meets a boy who does nothing but run, nothing but do something so pointless yet so beautifully fiery, Ivan is drawn. Cheesily, he uses a line that he always found a tad too overused — he feels like a moth drawn to a flame.
Or perhaps, it would be better to call Till the fire, the burning of embers, the very thing phoenixes are born from, and Ivan is the stillness, the quietness, that is a forest. The two of them together is a forest fire.
And Ivan burns.
He burns, quiet, bottomless, with the depths of undiscovered chasm, a jealousness he feels so revolting it churns in his stomach. When he sees the pink of the inspiration that Till loves, he does nothing but watch, with the same fascination one would watch a plane crash. Except he is deprived of any fascination, or any curiosity.
He merely burns.
“The world outside,” Ivan remembers himself starting, laying on the grass of Anakt Graden, days before the fateful escape and inevitable return. “Do you think there’s something for us there?”
“I think so.” Till says, staring at the sky. Ivan stares at him. “There must be something out there. Some place where we can be more. Without these filthy aliens.”
“Why, you finally gonna stop saying my rebellion is futile? Finally planning something, bastard?”
Ivan only smiles.
But the escape never happened. They never got to see if there’s something more for them, out there. Without filthy aliens. Together. Done through his plans. Where Till’s rebellion isn’t futile anymore.
Because Till’s here, and Ivan’s here, and the aliens are still here, too, and they’re watching them eagerly.
Till sings on the ALIEN STAGE, and he’s singing with a brilliance that Ivan compares to the rebirth of a mighty Phoenix, or maybe the way the sun’s rays would reach over the horizons and remind everyone that it’s still alive and it’s still here, or maybe the way stars would come out to shoot through the dark abyss of the sky. Till sings with a brilliance so utterly bright that Ivan almost erases the lyrics from his mind, almost erases the sight of the pink hair that Till is singing to.
But no matter how much he doesn’t want to think about it, he hears it, and it takes the forefront, before even Till’s voice.
“Don’t even think this time’s enough
cause you baby still it’s not enough,”
If Ivan hadn’t taken the hint yet, he figures he would’ve by now.
(He isn’t enough.)
And he knows this. He’s come to terms with it. He’s learned to reel his feelings in for years before he knew about Till — of course, he’d know enough to take the feelings that had formed a ball of yarn inside his heart and chuck it as far as he can. The string’s taut, but at least it’s far, far away.
So Ivan does the one thing he knows he does well in this fucked up world. He sings.
Till is still passed out after being detained towards the end of his performance. He will never know that this song he’s singing is about him, about his abandonment, about his ignorance. He will never know that this performance, that will most likely be one of his last, is about him.
The thought of it makes him as bitter as it does relieved.
He sings, and he sings for Till — but also for himself.
Whereas Till sings like a Phoenix, Ivan figures he’s singing the same way an organ would produce the music of a death march. He’s saying goodbye to himself.
And perhaps, he’s saying goodbye to Till, as well.
“At the end of this story, there is only a cold spot
Stained with blood and empty air.”
He wins. He knew he would. Of course he would.
And Till had won, too. It meant that they’re facing off against each other in the semi finals.
We always come back to where we came from, they say.
“You nervous?” He hears Till walk up towards him.
“Are you sure you aren’t projecting?” He hears his smooth voice quickly reply. He can practically hear the grin that surely covers Till’s face now.
“I got scared you wouldn’t have enough wits to reply back,” Till shrugs as they watch the fight between Hyuna and Luka.
“I think you wouldn’t be saying that if you were awake for my performance.” Ivan wryly states. He leans back and crosses his arms.
“I was.” Till tilts his chin up. Ivan catches his grayish green eyes. He’s never seen such a brilliantly pale color as his eyes.
“Liar,” Ivan tilts his head forward enough for his bangs to obscure his vision slightly. “You were out cold for most of it.”
“I heard enough of it,” Till persists. Ivan feels he’s being more stubborn right now, but he’s always stubborn. It’s why he’s always on the damn collar like a dog. “Lost your control on your pretty emotions back there at the end, didn’t you, bastard?”
He doesn’t have any air left inside his lungs to reply quickly. Does Till understand?
He doesn’t think Till understands. He didn’t hear the whole thing, anyway. So he pushes the thought outside of his head. Metaphorically, he reminds himself to grab the ball of yarn that is this emotion, and he throws it, chucks it, makes it fly, until it is as taut as the string of feelings he holds towards Till.
He still has a competition to fight.
On stage, under the eyes of the cosmos and the aliens and the other semi finalists, he only has eyes for Till.
It’s ironic how far they’ve gone.
How sad is it, at one point, they were so close to freedom? So close to the sky, to the shooting of the stars, to the brilliance of the world far away from here? They were so close, and yet, they’re still here. On stage, on the beck and call of the aliens, mere marionettes to the strings that will pull them where the alien’s amusement will peak. They never took the chance to get away.
Till, because he didn’t want to abandon Mizi.
Ivan, because he’s in love. He’s in love. He’s in love.
Till turns to look into his eyes, at that moment. In all his collared glory, Till gazes towards Ivan. And Ivan doesn’t know what expression he has on his face for Till to look like… he pitied him so.
“Don’t look at me like that,” Ivan taps Till’s cheek, just as they elevated to the stage.
“I didn’t look at you like anything,” Till starts, then strums a chord on his new guitar. “Bastard.”
Till dominates the scene right away. Ivan feels like he’s on the verge of tears. He prays it doesn’t show.
And it’s all because he treats Ivan the same way he treated Acorn. Like he’s no threat. Like he’s no more than a mere ant on the pavement that he’s walking on. Like he isn’t worth any second thought.
He wonders, then — if Mizi were to take his place, would Till have hesitated? Even if only for a little?
The once taut yarn of feelings grows slack.
But the look in Till’s eyes, as he gazes back to Ivan after he finishes singing a verse, was that of the familiar fire. It burns with the familiarity of home. Till strums his guitar, electric and aggressive and oh, so brilliant; he stares no longer at Mizi, instead directing his brilliant grayish green gaze towards Ivan; and Ivan… He stands in the middle of it all, mic in front of him, close enough to reach for it without trouble, but the task gives a daunting feeling all the same.
A burnt child loves the fire — said a writer, Oscar Wide, on Earth, once before. He thinks about his stillness and Till’s aggression. He thinks about his steadiness, and Till’s rebellion. He thinks about his forest, and Till’s fire. He figures he doesn’t mind if he burns, if it’s Till. He doesn’t mind being the embers that a waking phoenix leaves in its wake.
And he can’t have Till being disappointed in what could be their last performance, right? He’ll give him his best yet.
So, he does what he does best in this fucked up world. He sings.
He sings with the smoothness of spun silk, attracting the attention away from Till’s brash guitar. He sings with the softness he wishes he could direct towards Till, with the kindness that he knows contrasts the loud and dominating way Till entered the stage — and it’s that contrast, all the same, that makes him shine more.
He tears his eyes away from Till and looks towards the aliens. He has them in his palm now. With his smooth voice and apathetic demeanor.
But Till isn’t like his past opponent. He didn’t wait for his turn, barely giving Ivan the time to finish his verse.
He enters immediately with his guitar, and even Ivan’s surprised enough to turn around, making eye contact with Till.
Till sings, again, with the brilliance of a campfire lighting up in the dead of the night. Ivan burns, as the wood and the stone underneath, fueling the fire. He feels himself grin.
Before Till can even finish, Ivan drags the attention towards himself. But he didn’t break eye contact with Till, this time.
He sings with a growl to his voice now, weaving the melody of the song with his voice and with precise distortion. ‘An artistic choice,’ he’d say to Till, had this been done in their days inside Anakt Garden, without their lives on the line. ‘Or just you finally feeling emotions,’ Till would have argued back, in another timeline. Perhaps in another universe.
Till smiles. It’s almost as rewarding as when he jumps in to sing along with Ivan, different lyrics and melodies mashing together, and yet it works.
The ball of yarn has rolled back to his heart, now. It’s no longer taut, no longer so far away, no longer reaching other worlds with the length at which it was kept.
We always come back to where we came from, they say.
And so, his feelings for Till come back. Except it never went away, not really. He just kept it at a distance. So now, he finally feels it, fully.
Just like in Black Sorrow, he thinks of the times he’d spent with Till. He thinks of their fateful meeting in Anakt Garden, thinks of the way he’d broken rules for once to save him, thinks of his plans of escape, and what to do once they’re finally free.
It never really happened. But he likes to think it could have, in another time, in another place. He’s just happy he still has Till.
And now, he gets to watch him, singing with his brightness. And up close, he feels the fire and the warmth and he can’t help but think this is a good way to die.
The song ends. The numbers are rolling in the screens above them, the mechanic sound of it so hauntingly familiar.
Ivan finds he doesn’t care. He merely burns, staring into the fire’s eyes.
“I’m sorry,” Is all Till utters while the numbers above them are deciding their fate.
Maybe Till did understand. Or maybe, he doesn’t have to.
“You don’t have to be.” Ivan replies. He smiles, and unlike the time of the almost-escape, he doesn’t feel too sorrowful. “I wasn’t enough.”
“You weren’t enough.” He agrees.
The numbers decide. It felt like a million years before they did.
Till, 71 and Ivan… 70.
“I love you.” Ivan takes the chance, before he loses it again.
He holds the ball of yarn close to his heart, before snipping it away and giving it to Till.
He burns. But a forest can only burn for so long without dying.
He dies like a forest fire. And he dies, with the cool of the soil easing the burns.
We always come back to where we came from, they say.
So Ivan doesn’t die. He merely went home.