Ship/Member: Soonyoung/Minghao
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: revenge, obsession, sci-fi, traumatic accident, racing, tension
Permission to remix: Yes

title from epik high's rosario.

***

They think it’s a fluke the first time that Minghao wins against Soonyoung.

The commentators are so shocked at Minghao making it past the finish line before Soonyoung there is almost twenty seconds of silence on air before Andromeda Network’s Lee Jihoon chimes in and congratulates Minghao.

Social media across systems is buzzing with the news for the next two days and even the most even-toned post-race opinion piece is convinced of a number of possibilities if not all of them:

1. Soonyoung’s bike suffered an equipment failure that he humbly kept to himself to fulfil his commitment to the racing circuit.

2. The asteroid belt where the race was held underwent a time jump or a similar anomaly while they were on the track.

3. Minghao made illegal adjustments to his bike because he was desperate for his final shot at a comeback to the sport before his “serious” injury turned into a “career-ending” one.

Junhui, Minghao’s physiotherapist-turned-only real friend, sends links to the articles speculating against Minghao every afternoon, a flurry of angry emoticons accentuating his own stand on the matter.

Minghao keeps himself preoccupied with exercise, training and rest—reinvigorating himself before the next race weekend. Besides, for the first time since writing him off as 'damaged goods' since the accident, his agency’s PR machine has revived its interest in him.

There really is no such thing as bad press and the media loves nothing more than a brewing feud, the origins of which is free-use footage on the star-net garnering billions of views year after year; a mere thirteen-second clip to encapsulate the turning point of Minghao’s life.

On nights when his new shoulder grieves its human skin too viscerally for even medicated sleep to counter, Minghao finds himself adding to those views, watching the bike he built piece by piece for a decade and the body that he belonged to shatter like the collision of two distant, unexplored stars; the sparks on screen burning their image into his eyelids.

On those nights, the wretched and wanting voices he keeps buried push to the surface and let loose, wondering, if Soonyoung is awake in one of his own home bases too, watching and revelling at the sight of his body rising victorious from the blazing fire.

Junhui thinks Minghao’s obsession with Soonyoung is “unhealthy” and “detrimental to his progress”, both medically and otherwise.

But Junhui doesn’t know Minghao’s recovery has less to do with scientific marvels and more to do with the acrid taste of ash on his tongue, with the memory of every day spent at the hospital; the knowledge of every second on the track that Soonyoung has stolen from him.

In some twisted way, Soonyoung is the one who puts him on that hospital bed as well as the one who gets him out of it.

Minghao’s victory, when it finally arrives, isn’t quite the victory over the stars he dreamt of as a kid—it’s the cold, calculated undoing of his old best friend.

And Junhui can fret and threaten mental evaluations all he wants, after all, what does he know of the thrills of watching Kwon Soonyoung lose, race after race?

A fluke turns into a coincidence turns into a miraculous return turns into a dream comeback all the while Soonyoung re-learns to love Minghao’s shadow on the tracks.

Saturn losing its rings barely makes it to the headlines thanks to Soonyoung’s rare loss of temper after another narrow defeat, a resounding kick to his bike that has company employees in a righteous uproar and star-netizens clicking their tongues at golden boy’s ill-mannered display.

Minghao, who has a front-row view of the theatrics, catches himself admiring the lavender streaking through Soonyoung’s short hair.

If there is a perversion to Minghao’s every pleasure now, it is only because Soonyoung put it there.

The smiles come easier now, at every mandated event where they cross paths.

Soonyoung grows more wary, a tiger cornered in his own kingdom, and Minghao slips into the gaps in conversation that open up because of it, all too happy to rub shoulders with nauseating high society folk and live up to the moniker of snake if it means getting to run a sharp-nailed finger through Soonyoung’s gradually widening wound.

There’s a celebratory sponsors’ dinner on the night before the finals of the Starlight Series Cup, Minghao’s first since his comeback.

Soonyoung’s hair is now back to his natural dark brown, swept back primly; his suit is dark blue and unremarkable. It’s as if he’s already in mourning, unable to do anything but watch the peak of his life be snatched right out of his hands while he lies on the ground, bleeding.

Minghao tracks him dip in and out of groups mingling around the venue before he makes the predictable escape to the bathroom. Minghao gives it a minute before he follows.
The hallway outside is blissfully empty and Minghao removes the scarf around his neck and ensures the lapels of his suit hang loose on his shoulders. He had insisted on a shirtless, more risqué look for the night, much to his stylist’s delight.
Minghao waits with a hand on the door until it pulls from the inside, and he steps in matching its movement, crouched forward.

“Ah—” Says Soonyoung and Minghao looks at him just as his eyes fall down to Minghao’s bare skin, honing in on the scar running down from his neck to his chest. Soonyoung isn’t stupid. He has to know this is an easily removable scar—the fact that it remains intact can only mean Minghao has willed it so.

Minghao crowds him back, letting the full length of their bodies brush against each other.

"Myungho-yah,” Soonyoung starts, like he has any right to use that old endearment.

Minghao steps aside, refusing to acknowledge the miserable—shameless—part of him that keens at the very sound of Soonyoung’s voice uttering his name. He lets the door swing forward to hit Soonyoung on his way out.

Soonyoung doesn’t try to come back inside and Minghao turns to the mirror and works on retying his scarf the way it had been styled. His fingers tremble, just the slightest bit.

When he’s done, he washes his hands just to have something to do.

“See you tomorrow.” He says at last, all alone in the empty bathroom.

ughhh thank u, ily. i've never written them before, strangely enough!