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Yoongi comes home one night in a duller mood than usual. He throws his keys on the coffee table and hangs his jacket up. He flicks his lights on and collapses on his couch, scowling at the big, empty house that seems to serve a constant reminder of how alone he is. But that’s just how the world works.
At the age of eighteen, every person is given a house just the right size for two. It’s purpose is so that when you meet your soulmate, moving in is never an issue. You can sell your house and live wherever you’d like, as most couples do when they find each other, but it’s just a requirement that everyone is given one.
In all truth, Yoongi doesn’t know why he hasn’t sold his and bought a one-person apartment yet. It’s not like he needs this extra space, and he probably never will need it. But he holds onto it, like there’s a tiny drop of hope left in him. Or maybe he’s just grown attached to this old place, where he spent his college years. Though, at times like these, he’ll think bitterly about how someone else is supposed to occupy this space with him, but it’ll never happen. Not with his mark.
The way the mark works: You’re born with either a number or a black mark on the back of your wrist. The number tells you how far you are from your soulmate. The black mark can mean one of three things:
-Your soulmate hasn’t been born yet
-Your soulmate has already died
-You have a platonic soulmate
If your soulmate hasn’t been born yet, the black mark on your wrist will change to a number when they are born. When your soulmate dies, your number will change to a black mark and remain that way forever. Platonic soulmates are rare, but they do exist. Who’s to say that the only kind of soulmate is the romantic kind?
Two of Yoongi’s close friends, for example, are platonic soulmates.
Kim Taehyung and Park Jimin were born within three months of each other, and they’ve been platonic soulmates since they could barely walk. The mark, whether a number or a black mark, turns purple the first time you or soulmate speak to each other. Jimin and Taehyung were barely three when they were babbling nonsense to each other, and watched in confused wonder as the black marks on their tiny wrists turned purple. Since then, they’ve been inseparable. From kids, to teenagers, to adults, they’ve always been by each other’s side. The twenty-four year olds Yoongi knows them as are no different. They live together now, and Yoongi is willing to bet that they’re closer than any soulmate pair in the country.
Yoongi was born with a black mark, too, but unlike Jimin and Taehyung, he actually had a number. He was almost a year old when his black mark changed to a number. It was clear as day, printed on his skin, and his parents had no idea what to make of it. There, on his baby wrist, was the number 174,000,000 miles in tiny black print. Zeros and all.
When Yoongi was a small kid with no understanding of the world, or the meaning of those numbers, he would stare at all those zeros in wonder. When he was seven and his class learned about soulmates and what the numbers meant, he saw that his classmates had much smaller numbers that changed all the time, as opposed to his own, which was much bigger and never changed. That’s when he began frowning at his mark. By the time Yoongi was twelve, he had done everything he possibly could to try and scrub the mark off of him, to no avail. All it did was make his skin red and irritated from excess scrubbing.
When he was seventeen, he was so desperate to get rid of the embarrassing mark that he mixed with shady people who offered to tattoo over his mark to hide it. He knew it was pointless, but he did it anyway. And it was pointless. Just hours after he paid most of the money he had been saving for a new phone, the tattoo was already fading behind the mark, and the mark shined through, even more visible.
You couldn’t cover your mark, or get rid of it. It just wasn’t possible. You could cut off your hand, but why would you? If you did, though, the mark would just appear lower down your arm, and you’d just be handless. The only things Yoongi gained that day were livid parents, a three-week grounding, and an empty wallet.
So now, at twenty-seven, Min Yoongi still has those zeros. When he was younger, he covered it with his sleeves or a bracelet of some sort, but now he’s just learned to live with it. It doesn’t make him any happier, though. Clearly, the universe hated him. Whoever heard of your soulmate being 174 million miles away? Yoongi knew from extensive research that it wasn’t even possible to travel that far across the globe. This was the universe’s way of having a laugh, and unluckily for him, Yoongi was the butt of the joke. Giving him a soulmate, and making sure they’d never meet. Sometimes Yoongi felt as if his soulmate didn’t even exist, because it didn’t make sense. You couldn’t even travel 174 million miles across the globe, so where on Earth was his soulmate?
Tonight, he’s especially crestfallen, because his best friend, Seokjin, found his soulmate today. A guy named Jungkook, who moved from Japan to Korea, and worked at the art store. Of course, Yoongi is super happy for them. They shared the same kind of humor, and Jungkook seemed like a great guy. He was funny, super sweet, and perfectly… well, perfect.
But Yoongi is a selfish guy. He’s known Seokjin since he was in seventh grade and at the time, Seokjin’s number was also pretty large. Seokjin made Yoongi feel like he wasn’t alone. Scratch that, Yoongi is extremely selfish. He’s just jealous, but he’d rather die than admit it. For real, though, he’s happy for Seokjin and Jungkook. But now he’s even more reminded of how alone he is.
Yoongi ached for love, and not just the platonic kind. He wanted to meet his soulmate so badly, it hurt. He yearned to be loved in a way that only a lover could love him. Someone who would hug him on his bad days. Someone to tell him how much they loved him every day. Someone to fill the empty space in his heart.
Of course, Yoongi had tried dating in the past. Men, women, non-binary lovelies. He didn’t have a preference. He’d dated to fill the empty spot in his heart that was withering away into nothing from loneliness. But dating in a world where everyone has a soulmate is hard. Because those relationships will never fill the gaps meant to be filled by your soulmate.
Yoongi had to accept the fact that he’d never meet his soulmate. It was literally impossible. Unless some twisted fate of the universe could bring him his soulmate, it was for certain that he’d never find his soul partner.
Sighing in defeat, Yoongi heads to the bathroom. A nice, long, warm bath is what he needs right now.
“You do know you’re breaking like, six hundred laws right now, right?” Kim Namjoon asks his best friend as he watches him drag a metal contraption across the floor.
“Oh, for sure, Namjoon!” Jung Hoseok answers brightly. “In fact, I would be given a life sentence in prison if I were to get caught.” He doesn’t look remotely bothered about this, and states it as if it’s exciting news. Namjoon just looks at him.
“Come on, Joon,” Hoseok says.“I was born in the wrong place, and you know it. You know how long I’ve wanted this, and how many years of planning have led up to this moment,” he reminds Namjoon for the fiftieth time today. “Besides, who’s going to miss me?”
“I’ll miss you,” Namjoon says indignantly.
“But you’ll visit me,” Hoseok points out.
Namjoon sighs. “Yes, I will one day, Hobi. But it could be years before I get my certification, not to mention everything I’ve worked for so far will be taken away if I get caught helping you.”
“But you won’t get caught,” Hoseok says confidently. “As far as anyone is concerned, you’ve gone East for a few days for field study. You’re not coming home until late tonight. This is an unregistered space pod, because we designed it by hand. It isn’t in the system.”
“Well, yes, but-”
“Joon, you can’t back out now!”
“And I’m not!” Namjoon assures him quickly. “I’m just asking if you’re really sure you want to leave this place forever. Your home, Hoseok,” he adds.
“I’ve been sure of this since I was seventeen, Joon,” Hoseok says. “As you’re fully aware, I don’t belong on this planet. I belong on Earth.” Hoseok shows Namjoon the 174,000,000 miles on the back of wrist. “With my soulmate.”
Namjoon doesn’t argue. Because deep down, he knows his friend is right. Hoseok doesn’t belong on Planet Cypher.
Hoseok’s parents were the first and only Earth humans to ever discover Cypher, back in 1993. They were unwelcomed at first, because no Earth human knew about the existence of Cypher, and Cypherians were intent on keeping it that way. Dr Jung and her husband were the only astronauts who ever found Cypher, and in exchange for staying alive, they were never to leave the planet or contact Earth again. After weeks of no word back from the Jungs, Earth proclaimed them as dead, lost in space.
And so Cypher remained a secret. The Jungs lived fine lives on Cypher for the remainder of their time on the planet. Hoseok was born just six months after their arrival, in February of 1994. His parents died shortly after his birth, simply because they couldn’t accustom themselves to the planet’s air after a lifetime of breathing Earth’s oxygen.
After that, Hoseok was the only Earth human to live on Cypher. He grew up in an orphanage, because no Cypherian wanted an Earth human child . Earth humans and Cypherians weren’t very different at all, except for the pupils of their eyes. While Earth human pupils were small and just plain black, Cypherian pupils looked like galaxies, with sparkling white dots and planet shapes inside their large pupils. Other than that, Earth humans and Cypherians were no different at all.
It was more the principle of the thing. No one wanted to take in the offspring of Earth humans who found their planet by accident. Even the children in the orphanage stopped playing with Hoseok when they were old enough to understand who he was. He was allowed to attend a regular school, but none of the others would go near him, much less talk to him. He never fit in as a kid, and it didn’t get much better when he got to high school. The only thing that made high school a little more bearable was Namjoon, who didn’t seem to care that he was from Earth at all.
Throughout his childhood, Hoseok spent most of his time reading and learning everything about Earth as he could. Cypher was a technologically more advanced planet than Earth, and they knew much about the Earth, as opposed to Earth, who knew nothing of Cypher. Thus, the library supplied Hoseok with plenty of information about what his home planet was like. Hoseok would spend his lonely hours in the orphanage and at school reading about Earth, it’s society, it’s people, it’s history.
And while there were many, many things wrong with Earth, Hoseok would imagine what it would be like to live in a world where he fit in. He’d daydream of living in his own home on Earth, never being gawked at or ignored. Never receiving awkward stares from people just because his eyes were different, never being avoided just because of where he came from.
Cypher did have methods of space travel, and Hoseok had naively thought once upon a time that they might let him go home. But because of the law that stated that no citizen of Cypher was allowed to interact with other life forms on different planets unless that person carried an official certificate of Space Exploration, Hoseok was blatantly denied.
A Space Exploration certificate required much work, and very little were willing to do it. There were many tests you had to take to even be eligible to study and train for a minimum of eight years, and even then, it was no walk in the park. Hoseok had tried, of course, but he couldn’t even pass the first test. Even if he had gotten through eight miserable years of study and gotten a SE certificate, he would never be allowed to explore Earth. They’d station him someplace else.
Along with learning about Earth, Hoseok had spent his years learning all he could about his parents, where on Earth they had come from, and everything about the culture of that specific country. South Korea, the country was called, specifically, a city called Gwangju. He learned all he could about South Korean culture, history, and geography. He even studied their language. By the time he was twenty-two, he could fluently speak, write, read, and understand the standard Korean dialect.
Hoseok did all this with the pretense that he may one day find a way back to Earth, that he might one day escape Cypher. He was fifteen when he first thought about running away. He was seventeen when he was sure that he was going to run away, and that’s when he began devising a plan. He was eighteen when he began building his own space pod.
And then there was his soulmate mark. Of course, Hoseok knew all about soulmates. Cypherians had soulmate markings too, and they were the same as Earth human soulmate markings. A number or a black mark that told you how far your soulmate was from you. Hoseok was born with a number. A rather large number. 174,000,000 miles to be exact. This surprised no one, because they all knew Hoseok belonged on Earth, but the self righteous assholes never let him back there. They just let him suffer alone, knowing he’d always be different, that he’d be apart from whom he was meant to be with his whole life. Fucking bastards, Cypherians were.
So from a very early age, Hoseok knew that he had a soulmate on Earth who probably thought they’d never meet him. When Hoseok got older, he felt bad for the poor person on Earth who had no idea that there was someone out there in the galaxy, anxious to meet them. Hoseok had a million reasons for wanting to go to Earth, but meeting his soulmate, by far, was his biggest motive.
“You have the card, right?” Hoseok asks, breaking the awkward silence. Namjoon nods and holds up a small, plastic authorization card, borrowed from a spaceport employee. It was the most important part of Hoseok’s plan, because without an authorization card, his plan was pointless.
Spaceports were like regular airports, but they launched rockets and space pods into the galaxy, rather than airplanes that traveled only on Cypher domain. Except these weren’t open for the public, and were restricted to SE certificate holders. Mainly, they held rockets and space pods of all sizes, as well as launchers that would direct them to their exact destination. The space vehicles were much better quality, and much more comfortable than the one Hoseok had built for himself, but he couldn’t be picky. All space travel vehicles were registered into Cypher’s system and could be tracked, monitored, and controlled by Cypher computers. Hoseok had no hope of using those, because he would be found in two seconds and brought back to the planet.
So this was the plan Hoseok had devised when he was seventeen: Build a space pod in secret that’s good for a one-way trip, steal an authorization card from a spaceport employee, and authorize his own trip to Earth. It would’ve been difficult on his own, but when Namjoon agreed to help, the plan became more feasible. Namjoon was blessed with high intelligence, and he was studying to become a Space Explorer. He was up to six years into his training, which meant he was a trainee and knew how to work the technology in the spaceport. Hoseok was counting on Namjoon to get his hands on an authorization card since he was around employees 24/7. He also knew all the hours that the spaceport was empty, and when security was light. Namjoon could use the card to authorize his trip to Earth, and then delete the data from the computer system so no one would ever know. By the time anyone noticed Hoseok was gone, it would already be too late.
A difficult plan, and many things could go wrong, but Jung Hoseok wasn’t a quitter. He was going to Earth, with it’s global warming and pollution and corrupt governments and wars. He was going there, with its diverse wildlife and different seasons with snow and ice and blooming flowers and color changing leaves and warm, grassy fields. He was going to be free . He was going to be with people like him- him and his small, plain black pupils.
Not even 174,000,000 miles could keep Jung Hoseok away from what he wanted.
Thanks to Cypher technology and Namjoon’s precise calculations, if everything went right, Hoseok would crash somewhere in close proximity of his soulmate. His space pod would be irreparably destroyed from force of impact, and Hoseok might sustain some minor injuries, but it was a risk he was willing to take.
In short, eight years of planning and hard work had ultimately led to illegally taking a hand-built space pod on an unauthorized, one-way trip to Earth. Lovely.
Namjoon would never have agreed to help Hoseok if he hadn’t known the feeling of being apart from your soulmate. If he hadn’t learned Hoseok's story firsthand from Hoseok himself, he would never be doing this. Hoseok wasn’t some Earth spy who wanted to sell Cypher’s information to Earth and help Earth colonize them. Hoseok just wanted to go to his real home. He wanted to spend his life with someone who would love him, he wanted to fit in for once in his life. He deserved to live with other Earth humans like him, live in the world he should’ve grown up in.
Namjoon’s own soulmate was already gone. They had died before Namjoon got the chance to meet them. But he remembered the moment it happened like it was yesterday. He was twenty when it happened. His wrist said 63 miles when it faded and left a black mark in its place. And he knew that, somewhere in the world, his soulmate had died. And though Namjoon had never met his soulmate, he felt like a part of him had left that day. Which, it kind of did. Soulmates were called soulmates for a reason.
Namjoon was fifteen when he met Hoseok in the school library.
A boy with dark brown hair was asleep in the library on top of a book about Earth wildlife species. Surrounding him were many more open books, all about some aspect of Planet Earth. Except for one- a book about soulmates. The library was five minutes to closing, and Namjoon wondered why no one had woken him yet.
“Hey.” Namjoon shakes the boy gently. “The library is about to close.”
The boy opens his eyes slowly. “Huh? Oh, thanks.”
And that’s when Namjoon saw it. He was the Earth human, Jung Hoseok. He went to this school, but everyone avoided him. His eyes were just plain black, rather than the normal shiny galaxies in Cypherian eyes. Namjoon had heard that he was obsessed with Earth, and even rumors that if he ever went back, he would tell all of Earth about Cypher. Namjoon, of course, was not one to listen to rumors, but that’s all he knew about this boy.
“Do you want help putting the books back?” Namjoon offers.
“Oh, no, I’m taking these,” Hoseok answers quietly.
“Oh, okay. Do you want help carrying them home?”
Hoseok blinks. “Why would you do that?”
“Well, that’s a lot of books to carry by yourself. I’m in no rush to get home, I could help you carry them to your house,” Namjoon says, wondering why Hoseok looked so surprised at such a simple offer.
“Oh.” Hoseok thinks for a moment. “Sure. Thanks.”
Namjoon shrugs. “It’s nothing. Where’s your house?”
Hoseok’s face reddens, and he gets quiet. “I… live in an orphanage,” he mumbles.
That’s right. Jung Hoseok’s parents died a long time ago. He lives in an orphanage.
“Okay. Let’s go there, then.” Namjoon picks up a stack of books. “I’m Namjoon, by the way. Kim Namjoon.”
“I’m Hoseok. Jung Hoseok.”
“Nice to meet you, Hoseok,” Namjoon says, as if he has never heard the name before.
“Why are you doing this?” Hoseok blurts suddenly. “I’m the Earth human . Why aren’t you avoiding me like the other kids do?”
“You seem nice enough. Earth human, so what? You’re still a person, aren’t you?”
The rest was history.
Hoseok puts a resting hand on the space pod that took him years to build. It might have taken decades, if he hadn’t had Namjoon’s help. He looks at his wristwatch. They have exactly fourteen minutes left until all employees get off their break. They have exactly fourteen minutes to carry out his plan.
“Help me load this into the launcher, then?” Hoseok says. Namjoon nods and together, they manage to load the space pod into the launcher in the empty spaceport.
“You have your stuff?” Namjoon asks, and Hoseok holds up a duffel bag that carries everything important to him. Namjoon pulls a yellow file folder from his bag and hands it to Hoseok.
“Official documents, but tweaked to match Earth documents,” he says. “Your family history, place of birth- which I’ve made Gwangju- and any other important information you might need. There’s also a drivers’ license in there, which is the same as your Cypher license, but again, tweaked to match South Korea. Earth is big on official legal papers.”
Hoseok takes the file and opens it. “Joon, how did you manage this?”
Namjoon shrugs. “It wasn’t very difficult. We had a lesson where we studied Earth law and got to see documents up close. I just copied them and changed a few things.”
“You’re unbelievable, Joon. Literally a genius. Thank you so much.” Hoseok pulls the younger man into a hug.
“Earth isn’t super different from Cypher in terms of society, so you shouldn’t have much trouble learning how to act. Of course, you’ve done your research- I daresay you know more about Earth than even the Cypherians who have actually been there- but stay on the low until you know more,” Namjoon reminds him.
Hoseok nods. “Thank you, thank you, thank you,” he chants over and over again.
“I hope you find your happiness on Earth, Hobi,” Namjoon says, with all sincerity.
There’s a moment of silence, but it’s broken by a beeping from Namjoon’s wristwatch, telling them they have ten minutes.
“Ready?” Namjoon asks, even though he knows the answer very well. Hoseok has been ready for years now.
Hoseok pulls Namjoon into another hug, and his black pupils meet Namjoon’s galaxy ones.
“You’re the best thing that ever happened to me, Joon. I’m gonna miss you.”
“I’ll miss you more, Hobi hyung. Don’t forget me on Earth, yeah?” Namjoon tries for a smile.
“I’d forget my own name before I forgot you, Joon,” Hoseok says seriously.
Namjoon opens the door to the tiny space pod, and Hoseok climbs in. He barely fits, and has to bring his knees to his chest so he can fit his duffel bag under his knees. It’s extremely uncomfortable, but Hoseok doesn’t mind.
“Goodbye, Hoseok.”
“Bye, Namjoon.”
And with that, he lets Namjoon close the door to the space pod. Namjoon swipes the card and sets the destination coordinates, and the space pod powers up and whirs.
“Launching in 5… 4… 3...”
Namjoon waves and smiles through the window. Hoseok waves back.
“… 3… 2… 1... Launching!”
The space pod is lurched forward out of the launcher, and within minutes, it’s out of Cypher's atmosphere. Hoseok looks out the window, and he can see the stars sparkle all around him as he soars through the galaxy on his one-way trip home.
Next stop: Earth.
Yoongi is sitting in the bath, listening to comforting piano music and wallowing in his own misery, when he notices. At first, he thought it was a trick of the light, or the foam bubbles making it look different, but no, it’s definitely there.
His number is changing.
174,000,000 becomes 173,999,999 , then 173,999,998 , then 173,999,997 .
Yoongi blinks and rubs his eyes, and grabs a hand towel to dry off his hands, just to make sure he’s seeing this correctly.
173,999,890- 173,999,887- 173,999,883.
It starts slowly at first, but then the numbers are decreasing faster and faster.
160,540,762- 160,320,805- 159,500,621
Yoongi watches in amazement and disbelief. He’s almost mesmerized by what’s happening. In his twenty-seven years, his mark has never been anything other than 174,000,000 . What’s happening?
How can anyone even travel that fast? As a matter of fact, where the hell are they traveling from? What the hell is happening?
Yoongi sits there in the bath for what must have been hours, staring at the changing number on his wrist. His bath water is cold, and his fingers are wrinkled like prunes, but he pays no attention.
1,000- 987- 980
And then the number is changing so fast that Yoongi can’t keep up.
700- 500- 300
Fuck, what the hell? Yoongi stands up and pulls the drain of the cold bath, and towels himself off. He pulls on a clean shirt and pajama shorts, not moving his eyes from the number on the back of his wrist.
150- 70- 40
Yoongi wants to scream to someone, anyone, out of pure confusion and anticipation. But he lives in a secluded area. There isn’t anyone here within a ten mile radius. He still has no idea what’s going on, but his number is in the double digits. The fucking double digits.
And then…
20- 10- 5…
CRASH!
There’s a loud, deafeningly loud thud outside, right behind his house. And this, Yoongi is sure, has been heard by anyone within twenty miles of him. He’ll have cops outside his door in the morning, but he doesn’t really care. He runs to the back door, yanks it open, and runs outside.
0
There’s a heap of a million pieces of metal wreckage, and it’s smoking. Yoongi treads cautiously up to it, not daring to get too close. For several minutes, there is nothing but silence, and Yoongi decides the metal heap might have once been a rocket, or a tiny version of one. And then it moves.
A hand pokes through the wreckage, followed by another, and then a boy emerges from the wreckage. Yoongi manages not to scream, but it’s a very close thing. He’s got brown hair that looks charred, a scratched up face, and his hands are bleeding a little bit, but he grins like he’s won the lottery. And Yoongi can’t help but think that even though he doesn’t look his best, he’s still the prettiest man Yoongi ever laid his eyes upon.
“I made it! I really made it!” He exclaims. He notices Yoongi staring at him and the wreckage, looking absolutely bewildered. He waves in a friendly manner, ignoring that his hand is bleeding.
“Hello, my name is Jung Hoseok.”
Yoongi looks down, and the number on the back of his wrist- which is now just one zero- glows and turns purple.