Apocalypse ✦ Nomin

37

⊱ ───── { Jeno } ───── ⊰

"Jaemin!" Jeno shrieks at the top of his lungs as he watches him collapse to the ground. Jeno scrambles towards him, pulling Jaemin close as memories flash in his head of the last time he held a dying Jaemin in his arms.

"J-Jaemin? Jaemin, talk to me. Talk to me, please," he stammers out in a panic as Jaemin blinks slowly, "Not again, please."

"I...I'm sorry...Jeno..."

"Sorry for what? Jaemin, don't be sorry."

"For...for not being...more careful. I...I wish I could...could have spent more time...with you."

"Stop, please. We can talk about this when you've recovered," Jeno silences him as he looks up towards Mark and Donghyuck who stand merely a few feet away, "Don't just stand there! He needs help! Heal him! He's fucking dying! Don't you care?"

"Jeno-"

"Fucking help him!" Jeno screams as his eyes glow a vibrant red for a brief moment before dimming as he looks back down at Jaemin. Tears begin flooding down his cheeks as his chest begins to feel as if someone was gripping his heart and squeezing it mercilessly. "Don't worry. We're gonna fix you up and you'll be back on your feet in no time. Don't worry."

Jaemin smiles weakly at him and reaches his hand up to gently touch Jeno's cheek.

"I love you," he whispers, "Can you kiss me...one last time?"

"Don't talk like that," Jeno cries.

"Please..."

Despite feeling reluctant to do so, Jeno leans down and kisses Jaemin softly.

"I love you," he whispers, but he receives no response, causing his stomach to drop, "Jaem-min?"

Jeno moves back and finds Jaemin's eyes are now shut. He lies lifeless and limp in his arms, no longer breathing.

"Jaemin!" Jeno frantically looks up to the two angels still standing by, "Why are you just standing there? Why aren't you doing anything?"

"Because Jisung used the Ares sword, Jeno!" Donghyuck finally yells out, "He was basically dead the second it was plunged into his stomach. He's gone, Jeno."

"No! No, he's not gone! We can save him! I saved him once, I can do it again!" Jeno claims as he shakes his head frantically in denial.

"I'm sorry, Jeno...it doesn't work like that..." Mark states somberly with a deep frown etched into his face.

"It has to work like that!" Jeno bellows, causing Mark to flinch, "It has to..."

Jeno places his hand atop Jaemin's chest and squeezes his eyes shut. He recalls the last time Jaemin smiled at him: how it made his heart flutter to see it, again after so long. He tries to recall their last kiss before this and how it gave him warmth and security. He tries to focus on Jaemin. He tries his damnedest to heal him. But this time was different than the last. Jeno couldn't feel Jaemin's existence, anymore. It felt like he was reaching into a void and grappling at something that wasn't there.

He couldn't revive Jaemin.

Jeno gives up his efforts and instead opts to clutch onto Jaemin's lifeless body tightly in his arms, refusing to let go. In his mind, if he does that, then it would mean having to accept that Jaemin was now nothing but a soulless corpse. Jeno tries to fight it, but the overwhelming feeling inside him becomes too much to contain. He starts to sob violently as he begins to lightly rock back and forth.

"J-Jeno, I-"

"L-eave," he hisses at Jisung , "Jus-st leave."

Although Jeno wanted to tear Jisung apart limb from limb, he had no will do such a thing. Not anymore.

In the midst of his grief, he determines that he didn't want to leave Jaemin's body to lie in the street, nor did he want the angels to take him. He slowly rotates his hand in a lazy, circular moment, and the two are taken away in a cloud of thick, black smoke. When it dissipates, Jeno sits in the middle of his new study. He snaps his fingers and Jaemin is engulfed in smoke. He disappears from Jeno's arms, only to reappear inside a glass coffin. Jeno crawls over and sits beside it, peering inside at the ethereal man with soft blue hair. He looked just like a Disney prince, trapped in the grasp of a curse and awaiting true love's kiss to save him.

But this wasn't a fairy tail, and Jeno was far from a heroic prince. He wasn't going to swoop in—sword in hand—to slay the fearsome dragon, then climb the tallest tower and rescue Jaemin. Worse yet, it seemed as if they were never even meant to have a 'happily ever after'.

Jeno places a hand against the cold glass as he continues to cry.

"Last I checked, you had duties to fulfill."

"Leave me alone!" Jeno screams viciously at the top of his lungs.

"Is that any way to speak to your father?"

Jeno can hear his father's footsteps from behind, coming closer to him. He clenches his fists, preparing to fight.

"With both archangels taken care of, the angels don't stand a chance. We are now ready to-"

"Enough!" Jeno silences him, "Leave me be for once in your fucking life!"

His father goes silent, causing Jeno to feel tense.

"I will finish assembling our army. I will come to retrieve you once they are ready. You have no more than one hour," the man states firmly, "Until then, get over your pathetic sulking and self-pity. He was just a filthy little angel."

Jeno bites down harshly on his tongue, trying his best not to say anything else to his father. The longer he stays, the less time he has to mourn. Still, he turns to watch him leave. Upon doing so, his eyes land on a book sitting on his desk with a black cover and glimmering gold pages. Something about it makes Jeno gravitate towards it. He waits for his father to shut the door, then pulls himself onto his feet and shuffles towards it. He gazes at it for a second, then picks it up. He opens it and unsurprisingly finds that all of the text is in Latin. He begins skimming through until he reaches a page that catches his eye. In the middle of the righthand page, there is centered block text it is only a couple lines long, but it was one of the few texts that was formatted in that manner. He reads it and instantly recognizes it as an incantation. He reads the surrounding information and feels his heart stop for a brief moment. His hands tremble as he hastily shuts the book and places it under his arm. Jeno paces over to Jaemin's final resting place and kneels down beside him. He places his hand against the glass and nods to himself.

"Don't worry, baby. I'm gonna fix this."