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Jongdae discovers that near-death sounds like the quiet rush of air from Baëkhyun’s saber. That it smells like a clear evening, crisp like the snow crunching under Jongdae’s boots. He discovers that it tastes like blood that drips down his cheek and into the corner of his mouth, welling from a cut right under his eye.
He stumbles backward when he sees Baëkhyun wind up his arm again, muscles tensing and releasing in a pattern that would be fascinating if it wasn’t so scary, wasn’t so deadly. His saber gleams with the movement.
“Stop running, little spark,” Baëkhyun calls, a wide smile on his face. It’s an expression so much like Jongdae’s Baekhyun, it physically hurts to look at.
Jongdae doesn’t grace him with a reply, only taps into his ever-depleting core to send electricity down into his ankle joint, powering his jump backward and up the rocky hillside.
They had started at the bottom of the mountain, Jongdae on the run and Baëkhyun hot on his heels, as always. Jongdae is too far from their base to try and get any help, and even if he wasn’t, he doesn’t want to lead Baëkhyun there. As far as he knows, their base’s location is still a mystery to the doubles.
Looking down the steep mountainside now, sweat dripping into his eyes, he wonders how long they’ve been at it. The trees at the base are so small from up here, he can barely even make them out in the dim light of sunset.
He has better things to focus on anyway, Baëkhyun charging up the small distance Jongdae’s power jump had granted him as quick as light. His eyes glint in the twilight, dangerous like a predator about to pounce on their prey.
“Where are you planning to go once you reach the top?” he asks, breathing slightly labored and Jongdae brings up his arm, jacket reinforced with steel, to block the swing of Baëkhyun’s saber at the last second.
Jongdae grits his teeth at the sheer strength rattling through his bones. He pushes against it, up and away and Baëkhyun trips backward with the momentum of the shove.
For a short moment, Jongdae tastes something like relief at the back of his throat.
But then long, slender fingers, so familiar yet so strange, tangle with one of the straps of Jongdae’s utility jacket. Jongdae braces himself but the snow under his boot is suddenly no longer solid ground to stand on.
They fall.
When Jongdae comes to, the first thing he feels is the cold seeping all the way into his core, tingling not unlike his own electricity. Next, a searing pain shoots through his torso when he tries to breathe in a tad too hard. Ribs, a voice says in his head, tone not unlike Yixing’s.
He slowly tries to take stock of the rest of his body. He wriggles his toes in his boots, grasps at his pants with icy cold fingers, and turns his head this way and that. Nothing loose, at least nothing he can feel right now. He opens his eyes.
It’s dark. For a second, his heart jumps up into his throat, scared he hurt his eyes somehow. But then he sees a tiny speck of light from somewhere up above him. Not blind, then.
His ribcage burns when he tries to sit up and the strain pushes a groan out of his chest.
Someone replies in kind just a few steps away from him and Jongdae turns his head so fast it gives him whiplash.
The light from above is not enough to give him more than a vague idea of the other man but he knows it’s Baëkhyun, the groan of pain just like his own Baekhyun when he pulls a muscle while training.
For a moment, Jongdae is frozen not just by the snow all around them, but by the indication. At such close range, Baëkhyun will surely be able to overpower him. He’s bigger than Jongdae, broader, and probably just a bit stronger, physically at least.
Jongdae scrambles back a bit and feels solid, jagged rock under his fingers and at his back. The avalanche, set into motion by Jongdae tumbling down the mountainside after Baëkhyun, must’ve swept them into a small cave and then covered them, save for the small hole in the thick layer of snow.
The light is dim and Jongdae wonders how long they’ve been out. Long enough for the night to fully arrive, at least.
A pained cough from Baëkhyun’s prone form startles him from his musings. He groans again and then rustles around a bit. Jongdae can’t quite see what he’s up to but it sounds as if he’s trying to sit up, as well.
A moment later, the small cave lights up in bright, warm light. Jongdae hadn’t known that Baëkhyun could use his light powers to this extent, had only ever seen him use his speed-of-light ability. He’s not quite able to make his own body glow like Baekhyun can, but the orb of concentrated light energy hovering over his palm is more than enough for now.
Jongdae sees Baëkhyun’s eyes widen when he spots him at the other end of the cave. He looks worse for wear than Jongdae feels, one arm bent at a slightly weird angle and cradled to his chest protectively.
“What-” he croaks and then coughs, curling into himself. Jongdae’s ribs smart in sympathy.
“I… an avalanche…” Jongdae stutters, eyes flitting over Baëkhyun, searching for his saber.
“An avalanche,” Baëkhyun says, tone flat. He lets himself fall backward again. Only now does Jongdae see the big gash in his leg, pants torn and bloody around it.
For a few stifling moments, it’s quiet. Quiet and dark and cold. Jongdae shivers. He tries not to make it seem obvious but the chatter of his teeth gives him away.
Baëkhyun groans again but this time, it’s less of a pained sound and more of a resigned one.
“I dropped it,” he murmurs, more to himself. Jongdae feels his shoulders slump in relief. Baëkhyun doesn’t seem to be able to fight and if he doesn’t have his saber, even his light powers won’t be enough to overpower Jongdae easily.
Just to make sure he’s still able to, he lets a small spark jump between his fingers. Baëkhyun’s breath hitches at the crackle of static.
“Is this how you’ll do it? Buried alive under a heap of snow while I won’t be able to defend myself?” Baëkhyun spits, anger sudden and jarring. “I pegged you as a more honest man, but I suppose it’s kill or be killed, even for you good guys.”
His tone is full of disdain, face turned away from Jongdae. He can tell Baëkhyun is shivering too, flashy suit obviously not made to stave off the cold for too long.
“I’m not going to kill you like this,” Jongdae says, finally finding his voice again after gaping at Baëkhyun for a moment. “I’m not going to kill you. Not at all, if I can help it. If you attack me, I’ll defend myself but I don’t mean to harm you unprovoked, Baëkhyun.”
Baëkhyun scoffs and coughs again, this time longer than his first fit. But he turns his face over to Jongdae, staring at him through watering eyes, his whole body shaking with the force of his coughs.
He isn’t wearing his chain today, Jongdae realizes, a big, jagged, pink scar splitting his face in half where it usually rests. Jongdae has never seen him without the chain or a veil, and he suddenly realizes that Baëkhyun must’ve been trying to hide the scar.
Maybe he had lost the chain in the tumble earlier. Jongdae can’t quite remember if he had worn it while chasing him or not.
Baëkhyun’s coughs finally quiet down, a single tear slipping from an icy blue eye and down into his hairline.
Something aches in Jongdae’s chest at the sight. Baëkhyun’s leg wound is still sluggishly bleeding, and even from the distance, Jongdae can see him trembling, from pain or cold, he can’t quite tell.
He steels his nerves and shimmies up onto his knees. The ceiling of the cave would be high enough to stand, probably, but he doesn’t want to seem more threatening than he really is right now.
Baëkhyun looks at him with wide eyes when he starts crawling over on his hands and knees, slowly so as not to strain his ribs any more than he has to.
He stops right by his side, knees nearly touching the dip of his waist.
It’s nerve-wracking, being so close to Baëkhyun. Jongdae’s hands shake where they’re hovering over Baëkhyun’s body.
“I’m not gonna bite, little spark,” he scoffs, rolling his eyes at Jongdae’s antics. A small twitch in his jaw gives him away, though. He’s just as nervous as Jongdae is.
“Anything worse than that leg of yours?” Jongdae decides to ask instead of pointing it out.
Baëkhyun just shakes his head and then lets it thunk back into the thin layer of snow over the rock beneath him.
Undoing one of the straps on his utility jacket, Jongdae gathers a small handful of snow with his free hand.
“I have a small plaster with me,” he announces, “but it won't be enough to stave the flow of blood. I’ll put a tourniquet above the laceration and clean it up with some snow, then put the plaster as well as I can. The snow might also slow the blood.”
“I don’t need a degree in wound tending after this, just do it,” Baëkhyun grits out, a small hiss of pain escaping through his teeth when Jongdae pulls the shredded remains of his pants away from the cut.
It looks worse than it is, he thinks. He takes the strap he had undone and wraps it around Baëkhyun’s calf tightly, double-knotting it.
“Sure, but maybe next time you won’t just sit there and mope instead of doing some proper first aid,” Jongdae quips, then bites his tongue at the curious tilt of Baëkhyun’s brows. For a moment, he had forgotten that this is not his Baekhyun, but Baëkhyun, his enemy.
Baëkhyun just stares, right into Jongdae’s core. He hums, then closes his eyes.
Jongdae makes quick work of pressing snow into the cut. Baëkhyun hisses again at the first contact, but then the cold seems to numb the pain.
Pulling a small first aid kit from a pocket on his jacket, Jongdae wipes the wound dry, then patches it up with the only big plaster he has.
“Any other open wounds you can feel?”
“Why are you doing this?” Baëkhyun asks instead of answering. He looks deathly pale, even against snow as a backdrop. But he has a mole in the same spot as Baekhyun does, one that Jongdae likes to kiss when he’s feeling especially tender.
“You wear the face of someone I love, frankly. And I wouldn’t leave someone that’s hurt to slowly bleed out, no matter what they look like.
Baëkhyun’s breath stutters in his chest, and for a second Jongdae thinks he’ll start to cough again. But there’s wonder on his scarred face, something that looks like hope.
“So you love him? My Other?” he asks, sounding breathless and young, none of the scorn he usually wears like another weapon on his features.
Jongdae had wondered before if the clones were able to love. If they held hands, found comfort in each other's warmth, if they buried their noses into hair, smelling someone warm and soft held in their embrace.
It doesn’t look as if Baekhyun has done any of these things, but gods does it look like he wants to. Jongdae is suddenly horribly aware that the clones are young, scientifically aged up both physically and mentally of course, but still so young, so alone in the world.
If someone’s sole purpose on earth is to kill another person that wears your face, do you have any mind to card fingers through someone else's hair, to hug them so tight you feel the breath rush out of them?
Jongdae drops a hand down to Baëkhyun’s shoulder, feeling fragile for a moment.
“I love him, and I think I would in every universe.”
He brushes Baëkhyun’s hair away from his face, palm softly cradling his head. A soft breath rushes out of Baëkhyun and he looks scared, as if he doesn’t quite know what to do with tenderness. Jongdae thinks he might really not.
Jongdae smiles.
“Come on. Let’s get out of here. I’m sure there are people waiting for us as we are waiting for them.”