earth boys! ; yoonmin

TWENTY THREE

BOUNTY #7544

MILKY WAY GALAXY
OUTER SPACE
CIRCA 6018

Jimin can see the Earth from where he stands. Passed the glass, looking sad and lonely and like home. Jimin hates it. He loathes it. And it's home.

He hears someone come up from behind him but otherwise stays looking out the window. The grey dot looks pathetic from all the way up here. It makes him feel displaced and outside of himself. Jimin recalls Yoongi's reflection in the glass behind him.

"It didn't hit me until now." Jimin says in a far away voice. "Everything seems so insignificant from up here. But down there, when you're in it, it seems endless and inescapable." Jimin's tongue burns, I thought I would die there.

Yoongi didn't say anything. Jimin never speaks about Earth—barely anyone tries to ask anymore. So Jimin stood there motionless before the glass and felt heartbroken. "Is it weird that part of me misses it?" He glances over his shoulder to find Yoongi already looking at him. His eyes are unreadable and his face stoic. It seems he doesn't know what is proper to say, nor how to appropriately answer.

The corner of Jimin's lip twitches but it isn't so much a smile as it might appear. "When I was around thirteen, I met this girl. She was smaller than me in a lot of ways; short and thin. She had such big, round eyes, it made her look constantly on edge." Jimin looked back to the window for a moment. "We never really talked. I can't remember what her voice sounds like, and I can't really remember what she looks like. But I think we were friends. When you live on the ground, you don't have those."

"Why are you telling me this?" Yoongi steps closer, but doesn't invade the very apparent space between the both of them. Jimin doesn't have an answer for him. Why was he telling the man this?

"Nostalgia, I guess. Don't you wonder about the friends you had in childhood?"

"No." Yoongi answers, and Jimin doesn't think it's that weird. He didn't have anything to base it off of anyway. Jimin didn't have childhood friends. Just kids he saw at some point in his life; there one day, gone the next. He never thought much of it until now. It was fucked up and it made his skin crawl. Doesn't anyone care about what's going on down there? They are people too, so why aren't they treated as such.

"So the criminal," he chooses to redirect the conversation, "you're dumping him on Earth?"

Yoongi nods curtly. "We won't be in New Seoul if that's what you're thinking."

"What is there other than New Seoul?" Jimin jokes off puttingly. He knows he sounds uncomfortable, but he tries to fight it out of his voice and demeanor.

Yoongi chooses his next words carefully, speaking them slowly as if to not set something in Jimin off. "You're not obligated to step of the ship if you don't want to, Jimin." But his heart wrenches. There is something very conflicted in him that isn't sure whether he'd chose to stay in his room and avoid windows, or go with the team to release the bounty to the authorities.

He thinks he can handle it, but he isn't sure if that's what he wants—or needs. It feels like it's been forever, and somehow, simultaneously feels like he'd just left Earth a few days ago.

"I'm the navigator, it's my job." He says with a shrug. "I'm a big boy, Yoongi." He turns away from the window, away from the Earth. Yoongi is an intense person. Everything he does holds so much weight to it. Jimin can feel his eyes, heavy on his being, can feel what they're saying—Jimin doesn't want his pity. "Besides, I know that hellscape better than any of the crew on this ship. We may not be disembarking on New Seoul, but Earth is still Earth. Make sure captain prepares air filtering masks, too. I don't remember seeing anyone wearing them the last time you were there."

Yoongi narrows his eyes, wanting to say something, and Jimin momentarily thinks he isn't going to. "Phaedra was right, I think." It's quiet for a moment. "I haven't exactly known you that long, sure. Not as long as I've known the rest of the people on this ship, but I know I'm right about this feeling." He's in Jimin's space now, his eyes pour so intensely into Jimin's that he can't pull himself away. "I meant it when I said that you have us. I won't push you to ever say anything you don't want to, but..." He trailed off, adam's apple bobbing.

"You think I'm strong, Yoongi?" Jimin smirked, amused at the sudden shyness. He may have been playing it off casually, but he felt like he'd shatter if Yoongi said any more.

"Oh, pretty, I think you're a lot of things."

Jimin shoves his shoulder back playfully and lets himself laugh. "Not my name, not my name. How many times must I tell you that?"

Yoongi is closer. Jimin can smell the lingering scent of soap on him and he breathes it in. "Not here. Someone could see." He whispers, his lips ghosting Yoongi's, his eyes watching the way they part.

They don't kiss exactly. There's a quick peck, Yoongi tugging Jimin's lip playfully when they pull apart, and then he's stepping back into his own space. "I'll see you when we land."

Jimin works his jaw in constraint. He doesn't want to go back to his room, or find some other way to entertain himself. He wants to follow Yoongi back to wherever it is he's going. He wants to talk and laugh and play around. Still, he lets the man turn a corner without following.

He's alone again, and it's empty and cold. He looks back out to the window where the Earth spins slowly. They were one in the same.

________
this is way shorter than i usually post, i know, but i wanted to get something out before all the holidays began.

are you guys doing anything fun? spending time with family and friends? on my end over here, we're just spending time together at home. i think we're going to spend the evening with family friends though.

anyways—be safe and warm and know you're loved! happy holidays and happy new year!