Angry Giants
Angry Giants (PG) AU Woohyun/Hoya | A five minute scene of two dying soldiers of the Korean War.
Bazookas are scary things, Howon thinks. There's enough dust in the air to smog an entire village. A giant bounces on a dusty sofa not far off. More dust. Howon suppresses a cough.
The year is 1952, and things are going nowhere with the military conflict. Howon sees no end to the explosions. The hostility. At night, Howon and his platoon mates share stories about what it was like to be back home. How many siblings they have, and how hard their fathers hit their poor mothers for cooking rice a little bit too sticky. Sometimes it's funny stories.
Woohyun told them a story about how he cooked his first family meal and nearly blew out the kitchen. He was about eight years old, and the blast had been just as big as the recent one in the nearest village. The same number of casualties, too. His father had been so angry, not because of the fire, but because the rice was too sticky.
They all laughed about it over smokes.
Howon angles himself above Woohyun's dust-dredged body. "You don't look very good," he says, "man I hate bazookas."
"You and me both," Woohyun says, coughs elaborate and loud. There's probably shrapnel in his lungs. He tries to laugh, but ends up coughing for a good three minutes. Howon hovers over him, puzzled. A movement to pick the clumps of dirt out of Woohyun's fringe. Woohyun is squinting. "We're going to die."
"Just as well. If you live, your daddy is going to kill you when you get back home for cooking shitty food," he says. Woohyun manages a laboured bark of laughter. If the war were a fashion statement, they'd be the poster children for body modification. Dirty tattoos, big fat keloids. Piercings.
"D'you ever wonder why we're doing this? I mean, doesn't it seem mad to you?" Woohyun asks. Howon wants to put a finger to his lips, cut and bruised, get him to shut up. Run some water over his blackened cheeks. Of course it's mad. The world is a mad place.
"The world is a mad place," he says. "But it seems really interesting!"
Howon has to shout, because just beyond their line of sight, a stream of jets are heading their way. A giant thuds his fist against a tabletop not far off. More bombs.
"It's so interesting, I want to learn all these different cultures from all these different places! India! France! The rest of Asia!" Howon rolls off Woohyun and lies down beside him, flinging a careless arm over Woohyun's torso. His lips are at Woohyun's ear, but the dying man can barely hear a word he's saying. "But I'll never get to because we're going to die in this war!"
"What!" Woohyun says, eyes shut tight now. The pressure from the planes warp the skin of their faces. "I can't hear you! What!"
"I don't know which of us will die first!" Howon says, resting his head in the hollow of Woohyun's collar. "I love you! I love our platoon!"
Woohyun seems to have heard, turns to Howon and shouts back, "If I die and you're still alive, try and tell someone that I don't want anyone hacking my body up! Especially not my balls!"
"Okay!" he agrees. Woohyun smiles, eyes lidded.
"I love you too!" Woohyun says. "Did you ever find my arm!"
"No! I'm sorry but I never really bothered looking for it!" Howon and Woohyun are holding each other, keeping the conversation casual, light. Cries for help can be heard every so often, but other soldiers are huddled together in groups on the ground like they are, waiting.
"You can have mine!"
A giant flips a game of Life! over, game pieces scattered all over the floor. As it happens, the pair die together, instant.
Dust clouds settle, blanketing a garden of dead soldiers.