Mortal Masks

Chapter Ten

It was only when he was drowning in darkness that Jaemin felt like he could finally breathe.

When the cool shadows cloaked his body, slithering over his arms and chest, binding him to them, that the sensation felt like that of coming home.

Like always, he moves slowly through the darkness, following his usual path through the void of his own mind. After all that had happened since he arrived in this town, to be back in his own secluded environment felt good. It felt almost safe, it felt-

"Jaemin..?"

The hairs on the back of his neck stood upright.

"Jaemin, you came back!"

Spinning around, trying to locate the voice like he had tried to do once before, Jaemin scans the darkness, and just like before, he doesn't spot anything of interest.

The voice calls his name again, and this time he takes off blindly, his excitement and curiosity causing him to stumble through the shadows, calling out for the voice to keep talking. He couldn't bear it if they fell silent again. He had to find them.

The smoke around his feet parted as if to let him pass through, to surge him on. This was, after all, his own imagination, surely. But it's when his legs begin to ache, when that flicker of hope that burns bright in his chest wavers slightly at not spotting the person he so desperately is searching for, that Jaemin sees something ahead- a figure.

Oh God, could it be... is it them? Is his search over?

And just then, they turn around.

And Jaemin feels winded.

It's like this world of his has stolen the air out of his lungs, like he's still running, his breath growing ragged as the person's eyes meet his.

It's Jeno.

His black hair falls over his eyes as he squints in the darkness, his body crouched and guarded as he studies Jaemin carefully, and then his lips move.

"Jaemin?"

But the sound that comes out isn't the sugary voice he's becoming accustomed to in his head. The voice that comes out of Jeno's mouth is his own. It's familiar in its own right, but it's not the prize that Jaemin has been hunting.

Who he's looking for, it's not Jeno... and so why was he here?

"Jaemin?" Jeno calls again, standing up in the darkness and looking so incredibly happy to see him. Jaemin can only describe the emotion that lights up Jeno's face as one of relief, but just as Jaemin is about to make his way across the abyss to the boy- there's something to the left of him that captures his full attention.

Something that glistens in the shadows. And the chill that he first felt on his first night in this town when he was submerged in his mind takes root in his body.

Something didn't quite belong here.

Something was wrong.

Jaemin focuses on where the glimmer was, his eyes following the subtle movements. It was drawing nearer, becoming more defined.

His eyebrows furrow as he watches the shape form from a shimmer into something long and curved. It looked almost silver in the dim light. It was large, larger than he could have imagined, and when it rose from the blanket of clouds that covered the ground, Jaemin was met with a frightening realisation.

He knows this object, this weapon.

It was a scythe.

But what was more frightening was who was wielding it- or should he say, what was wielding it.