No Boundaries
Theme #37: Rotation
Title: No Boundaries
Pairing: Hankyung/Kyuhyun
Rating: PG-13
Word count: 4,033
Summary: Kyuhyun’s lived in a protected glass dome all his life, safe from the terrors of the outside world. But when he meets a person from there, it forces him to rethink everything that he knows.
A/N: Written for dragons_desire, who asked for a future/post-apocalyptic AU in the SuJu Secret Santa Exchange, original post here. Merry Christmas! ♥ I wrote another fic for the exchange when someone else backed out on their Santee, but I'll post that tomorrow so I won't flood my f-list, haha.
I'm also using this for the 100 Challenge, Theme #37, Rotation. (ROFL I am so lazy.)
___
Ever since he was a child, Kyuhyun’s been told that the Outside is a bad place.
The Inside, where he lives along with the rest of the civilized world’s population of 250,000, is home to Kyuhyun, and all he ever knows. It’s a beautiful world, Kyuhyun always thinks, the weather and temperature carefully regulated by turbines, everything bright and clean and perfectly manicured, surrounded by a glass dome that keeps everyone safe from the hostile Outside.
When Kyuhyun was still in school, he’d been taught that centuries ago, there’d been a war, something terrible that devastated the planet and forced the few remaining thousands of people left into this glass dome. It had originally been much smaller and then enlarged over the years, dome encasing dome encasing dome until it’d grown to its current size. The conditions Outside are terrible, Kyuhyun’s told; volcanoes that never stop erupting, temperatures that fluctuate between freezing, biting cold to scorching hot in the course of a single day, and everything is arid and dry and bleak.
And then of course, there are the Outsiders.
They are the people, Kyuhyun had been taught, who had been left behind when most of the world retreated to the Inside; people who either weren’t allowed in, because of physical deformities (and Kyuhyun can’t grasp the idea of deformities because everywhere he looks in the Inside, people are created to fit in, to be perfect perfect perfect), or people who refused to enter. Kyuhyun’s never really told why these others had refused to come in, but he wonders why there were people who would choose to remain Outside, where it’s dangerous and inhospitable and people have to scrounge off the dead barren soil for a mere mouthful.
He still can’t help thinking, though, that it’ll be nice to see the Outside, just once. Just to stand out there and feel the wind on his face, wind that isn’t created by a person manning a weather system, or see what the sky really looks like beneath the artificial blue and star-speckled black of the dome. He never tells anyone about this though. It won’t do for an Insider to not conform in thought, word, and deed. Conformity means stability, and that’s something the Outside doesn’t have.
___
Kyuhyun’s home is located near the Border, the single gate that connects the Inside to the Outside, and he likes to wander near it, just to stare at the night sky through the glass, and wonder how it manages to look the same as it does on the Inside. Where are the fiery skies of red and black sooty ash that his teachers had always mentioned? And there aren’t miles of cracked, dry ground as far as the eye can see; in fact, while the ground Outside isn’t covered in lush greenery like the Inside is, it’s just - plain and boring, and grassy, with even some shrubs dotted here and there.
The more Kyuhyun sees of the Outside, the more he starts wondering if everything he’s been taught is true. He thinks on this for a few minutes each day before the mental self-censorship, ingrained from years of classes where he’s told that Inside is good, Outside is bad and We do not question, we only obey, kicks in, and he forces himself to think less.
He remembers his teachers always saying, with resigned shakes of their heads, that Kyuhyun will never make a good Insider, because he always thinks too much, questions too much, makes his teachers and fellow Insiders uncomfortable. He remembers thinking, too, that even though no one ever says it, that they probably think something went wrong with his Creation, when he was made, and that’s why he doesn’t blend in with everyone else. It’s not the first time the geneticists at the Creation Laboratory would have messed up with embryos when they’re created, anyway, and occasionally there’ll be people like Kyuhyun, people who don’t conform, who cause instability.
He knows for sure that he’s considered as one of those people when he’s gently informed, upon finishing school, that there’s no need for him to work - when all his peers are assigned jobs according to their talents and abilities, jobs that facilitate the smooth running and continued prosperity of the Inside. Instead, he’s given a house near the Border, suitably far from the city centre, and monthly state handouts, and left to his own devices.
It’s no different from being thrown to the Outside, Kyuhyun feels. But then when he wanders to the Border, walks along it as he trails fingers along the cold glass wall, he finds that being by himself can be good. He has all the time and freedom to think about anything he wants, anything at all.
___
It’s on one of his nightly walks near the Border when he sees an Outsider for the first time.
He normally doesn't see much Outside, because the lights from the Inside blaze so brightly, even at night, that he can't look out. He catches a glimpse of movement though, enough to catch his attention, and as he moves closer to the glass, a face suddenly looms out of the darkness, making him start and jump back, and it disappears as quickly as it had appeared, though Kyuhyun can just make out the Outsider's silhouette as it moves further away from the glass.
He’s breathing heavily and his hands are shaking, because he remembers all too well what his teachers had said about Outsiders, that they’re cold-blooded savages who have no one to guide and lead them like the Insiders have, people who grow up wild on the Outside and who are envious of the beautiful Inside and all the people in here. He also remembers that they were always warned never to try to communicate with any Outsiders they see, because Outsiders wouldn't hesitate to butcher an Insider, and Insiders are all calm and peace-loving, and wouldn't be able to defend themselves.
These thoughts run swiftly through Kyuhyun's mind, but he can't forget the look on the Outsider's face, a look that he’s fairly certain mirrors the fear on his own face. He doesn't understand why a fierce, wild Outsider would be afraid of a defenceless Insider like him. It piques Kyuhyun's curiosity, though he knows better than to tell anyone Inside what he'd seen, and all the questions about Outsiders he’s dying to ask. Curiosity, he knows, isn't a trait that was much valued on the Inside.
And then he realizes: this is an advantage of being left alone, because he can do whatever he wants.
___
Kyuhyun begins seeing that Outsider almost every night from then.
It always starts off like the first time they'd seen each other; Kyuhyun will be walking along the Border, and there’ll be a movement off to his left, and when he turns, he'll see that Outsider, pressed against the glass, looking in, and both of them will jump before the Outsider will turn and leave, disappearing into the blackness of the plains outside.
The fourteenth, or maybe fifteenth time Kyuhyun sees the Outsider, he doesn’t jump. He steps forward, hesitantly at first, and the Outsider shrinks back, but before he can turn away Kyuhyun reaches out and places his hand on the glass.
This close, Kyuhyun can clearly see the look of shock that crosses the Outsider’s face, and if he’s to be honest with himself he’s scared, too; years and years of repression and obedience, pared down to this, his hand on the Border and waiting for a response from an Outsider. But more than the fear, Kyuhyun wants to know, wants to learn, wants to feel something other than what the Inside, always sanitary and orderly and perfect, can give him.
He’s concentrating so hard on trying to slow his thumping heart that he almost doesn’t see it when the Outsider lifts a hand slowly and puts it against the glass, right where Kyuhyun’s hand is, and as Kyuhyun stares at it he fancies that he can feel the warmth of the Outsider’s hand, traveling straight through the six inches of the special glass-and-plastic alloy that makes up the Border, into his own hand and body.
Then the Outsider smiles, and Kyuhyun blinks, because that smile transforms his entire face, makes his eyes crinkle attractively at the corners and his whole countenance soften. The Outsider curls his fingers slightly, and so does Kyuhyun, and before he knows it, he’s smiling too.
Kyuhyun’s never thought that this barest minimum of contact with the Outside can be so fulfilling.
___
It’s the closest thing Kyuhyun’s ever had to a proper friendship, glass barrier notwithstanding; he finds himself heading to the Border everyday, settling himself crosslegged on the lush grass carpet in front of the Barrier, shielding his eyes from the sunlight Outside that streams in to blend with the artificial light on the Inside, waiting for the Outsider. He’s always there soon enough, sometimes even before Kyuhyun arrives, and he sits down just like Kyuhyun does, except that the ground he sits on is bare and the soil is loose and crumbling.
Now that they meet during the day, Kyuhyun can see that the Outsider looks just like any Insider does, with the same skin, same four limbs, same everything. His clothes are simple and archaic, compared to what Insiders normally wear, but they fit him nicely, the indeterminate fabric at his legs tight and accentuating little swells of muscle that Kyuhyun finds himself fixating on. He’s wearing only a single layer on top that Kyuhyun can see, the cutting and design unfamiliar to Kyuhyun, and he tugs self-consciously at the collar of his polyester garment, the artificial fibres suddenly uncomfortable against his skin. But above all, his clothes look normal, he looks normal, nothing at all like the wild-eyed, shaggy-haired savage dressed in the skins of people they’ve killed, unlike what he’s been imagining all his life.
They smile at each other a lot, sometimes pressing fingers to the glass and laughing when their fingers leave smudges that magically disappear after a few seconds, the material of the Border always maintaining its pristine appearance. Sometimes the Outsider swipes quick strokes across the glass, forming shapes and symbols that slowly dissolve, and it takes Kyuhyun a while before he realizes that the Outsider’s trying to write messages to him, but they vanish too quickly for him to pick anything up.
Kyuhyun hits on the idea of trying to speak to the Outsider after a frustrating hour in which both of them scrawl messages on the glass, which disappear all too soon, and even though Kyuhyun still isn’t certain if they even speak or write the same language (that’s something the teachers back in school never did mention, he recalls ruefully), he tries it out by mouthing a simple, Hello.
The Outsider’s eyes widen and he cocks his head to the side, and Kyuhyun tries again, moving his lips carefully and slowly. Can you understand me?
There’s a few seconds of tension, and then the Outsider’s face splits into a wide grin, and he nods, mouthing in return, Yes, yes.
Kyuhyun feels a prickle of excitement run down his spine - more than a prickle; goosebumps are rising on his arms despite the balmy warmth of the Inside and his palms are sweaty and there’s a lump in his throat that he can’t swallow away, because as far as he knows, he’s the first Insider in centuries to speak to an Outsider.
What’s your name? he asks, almost shaking in his excitement.
It takes several times before he can read what the Outsider says, but when he catches it, he says it out loud, tests the name on his tongue. “Hankyung,” he says, the syllables not at all unfamiliar. “Hankyung,” he repeats, and the Outsider smiles and nods.
___
I’ve always wanted to go Outside, Kyuhyun tells Hankyung one day.
Hankyung’s playing with bits of grass on the Outside, kicking disconsolately with his boots at the Border as if he wants nothing more than to trample it down, but he stops when he reads what Kyuhyun’s said. Really?
Yeah, really.
Hankyung laughs, and Kyuhyun imagines - wishes - that he can hear his laugh, hear his voice. Why? Don’t you always tell me how comfortable it is Inside?
Kyuhyun shifts so that he’s leaning sideways against the glass, his body making an imprint against the material, and Hankyung moves so he can lean against the glass as well, against Kyuhyun. I don’t know, he says, careful to turn his head so Hankyung can see him speak. I just feel like there’s nothing for me here, really.
And there’s something for you on the Outside?
Kyuhyun stops to think. He thinks of all that he’s learned on the Inside, all that he’s felt. He thinks of how he’s lived his life, ostracized by everyone else because he’s a possible cause of instability, thrown out alone near the Border, a drain on state resources. He thinks of how he’s always challenged everything he’s been taught and told, how he’s wanted to break out of the suffocating expectations placed on him to be someone he’s not. He thinks about how absolutely unfair it is that all these happened to him, simply because some geneticist forgot to give him a certain enzyme or didn’t splice his cells correctly when he was an embryo, and because of that, he’s not a robot like the rest, passive and obedient and content with their lot, and he has to shoulder the stigma of being a threat to the carefully-maintained society the Inside’s built on.
Most of all he thinks about Hankyung, and how Hankyung has given him more happiness and contentment in a month than he’s had in 21 years Inside.
There is something very important to me Outside, he tells Hankyung at last. Something that I wouldn’t mind leaving the Inside and everything here for.
Hankyung’s smiling at him as he says it, that soft smile that makes Kyuhyun’s breath catch in his throat as Hankyung’s eyes curve into perfect half-moons. I’ll dance for you when come Outside, he says.
You dance?
Hankyung nods. I do, he says, and Kyuhyun imagines Hankyung in his mind, all beautifully sculpted muscles and pure control, spinning and whirling with spellbinding grace, and it takes his breath away even in his mind. He leans his cheek against the glass, and sees Hankyung do the same from the corner of his eye.
___
Tell me about the Outside, he demands of Hankyung one day, and Hankyung looks astonished at his question.
Don’t they tell you how it’s like? he asks, and Kyuhyun frowns, because yes they’ve told him, only he isn’t sure if it’s the truth.
I want to hear it from you, he says, and Hankyung, as always, gives in to him without question.
He watches Hankyung’s lips carefully, feeling lost in the multitude of words that are so strange and foreign to him, words like government (the concept doesn’t exist in a society that’s presided over by a single Controller), nuclear weapons (a peaceful, loving society needs no weapons, he’s been told), and birth and parents (in Kyuhyun’s world, there are only the geneticists who grow embryos, there is only a Creation, and children are cared for by teachers until they begin work in their pre-assigned jobs).
That’s also how Kyuhyun learns that everything he’s been told by the Insiders are lies, because those hundreds of years ago, after the war that killed most of the world’s population, a handful of people, who would later become the predecessors of all the 250,000 people currently living on the Inside, retreated inside the glass dome they’d had commissioned before the war began, and barred entry to everyone else.
Wait, Kyuhyun says. They prepared the dome before the war started?
Hankyung’s face is somber as he nods, eyes searching Kyuhyun’s face as light begins to dawn on Kyuhyun.
The Insiders caused the war, didn’t they, he says quietly, and Hankyung nods again.
Kyuhyun feels fury rising up in him, such as he’s never felt before, imagining the elaborate cloak of lies they’ve constructed, passing it on generation after generation, and finally to him. And they chose to save themselves, and not anyone else?
Yes, Hankyung says. But some people survived outside, and those are our ancestors. And it’s been centuries, Kyuhyun, centuries without machines or wars or pollution, and the planet has been recovering. It’s not all doom and gloom out here. It’s not all ash and smog and unbreathable air and starvation.
Kyuhyun looks at Hankyung, at his animated face, the brightness of his expression, and yearns for that same happiness, the same freedom that Hankyung has Outside, and suddenly he wants nothing more than to be able to step on real soil, breathe real air, and hold Hankyung’s hand in his without this stupid barrier between them.
I want to go Outside, he says with newfound determination, and Hankyung unfolds himself from the ground, grit falling from his pants, all long lean limbs and lithe gracefulness with every movement.
I’ll be here, is all he says.
___
The Border is always open from the Inside, Kyuhyun knows. Anyone Inside can step out anytime they wish, but the problem is, it isn’t accessible from the Outside, so once someone leaves, they can never come back.
Kyuhyun steps up to the retina scanner mounted on the gate of the Border, and he’s shaking so hard that he has to realign himself several times with it before it can scan his iris properly.
His fingers are shaking, too, when he’s prompted to press the green button for ‘Yes’ or red for ‘No’, and they slip off the button several times before he manages to depress it, and the sound of the gate clicking open sends tremors through his body.
But he pushes the gate open and stands in the gateway for a moment, trembling as a cool breeze from the Outside strokes past his face, and it feels and smells so different from the inside - more earthy, more rich, more real. And for a second his resolve wavers, and he almost turns to step back in, but he remembers Hankyung, and how he’d promised Kyuhyun he’d be there, and Kyuhyun steps out completely, letting go of the gate.
It clangs shut behind him, the sound resonating with dull finality in Kyuhyun’s ears.
He’s still shivering when he turns to face the wide vastness of the Outside, but he sees Hankyung in the distance running towards him, running with a broad grin on his face. He almost cries, except he doesn’t because Hankyung has reached him, and it’s all he can do to collapse against him, his legs unable to hold him anymore.
But Hankyung does.
___
Hankyung doesn’t live near the Border, as Kyuhyun expects; he lives in a proper city further inland, a place not unlike the Inside according to Hankyung’s descriptions, except perhaps less modern, because “we’ve learned our lesson, machines aren’t necessary for survival”, as Hankyung puts it. But he has a tent, bivouacked some miles from the Border, because Hankyung, much like Kyuhyun with the Outside, has always had a fascination with the Inside and the Insiders, and used to explore the Border frequently.
“And then?” Kyuhyun asks as they walk together to his tent, still marveling at the feel of rough grit under the soles of his cloth shoes, suitable for artificial grass and carpet but not the raw ground of the Outside; Hankyung’s promised to make him clothes and boots, and Kyuhyun finds himself fascinated by the thought of Hankyung’s nimble fingers fashioning things that will be draped onto him.
“And then I found you,” is all Hankyung says, almost casually, and it isn’t really an answer to Kyuhyun’s question, but he’s too distracted by the fact that he can now hear Hankyung, his accent unfamiliar and different from what Kyuhyun’s used to but still somehow enchanting, and that he can now feel him as well, as he demonstrates by taking Kyuhyun’s hand as they walk.
Kyuhyun squeezes him tightly, stumbling a little over uneven ground that he’s not used to, Hankyung’s hand warm and callused in his and so, so different from touching it through a glass barrier.
___
Kyuhyun’s still amazed at everything he sees after a month, from the sight of Hankyung’s hunting rifle to the books he has, about things Kyuhyun’s never heard of before like religion, philosophy, history. He devours the books Hankyung has in his tent, exclaiming at every sentence and asking questions often. Hankyung laughs at him sometimes, and he snaps back at Hankyung, but at night they wrap themselves in blankets against the chilly air, so different from the teperature-controlled Inside, but so much better with Hankyung’s warm body pressed against his.
It’s their end of their first month together when Hankyung builds a fire outside the tent at night so he can grill slices of meat for both of them, carved off a boar he’d shot himself. Kyuhyun’s never even seen a wild boar before today, all the food on the Inside made from a complex scientific process that produces packages of nutritious but boring mush, but the moment Hankyung feeds him the first slice he knows, for certain, that he doesn’t regret leaving the Inside.
He’s full to bursting when he leans back on the rocky soil, tucking his arms behind his head and staring up at the night sky, bursting with stars and so, so much prettier than the artificial one the Inside creates, and he thinks it’s amazing how 21 years of teaching can melt away just like this, until he can spread himself out on the ground of the place he’s always been taught to fear. “How was it?” Hankyung wants to know, beaming, and Kyuhyun opens his mouth to answer but he remembers something else.
“Dance for me, Hankyung,” he says, and Hankyung, who’s about to settle himself next to Kyuhyun, stills.
“You want me to?” he says in a hushed voice, as if not quite daring to believe it.
“You said you would,” Kyuhyun says, sitting up and staring at him.
Hankyung smiles. “So I did,” he replies, and Kyuhyun, hardly able to help himself, leans forward and kisses him impulsively.
“Dance for me,” he repeats against Hankyung’s lips, every movement sending frissons down his spine, and Hankyung’s hands are on his arms, his hips, pulling him closer. “Dance for me,” he says, and Hankyung pulls back.
“I will,” he promises.
___
Hankyung is almost like beauty personified as he whirls around Kyuhyun in tight circles, balance in every limb from the tips of his fingers to his pointed toes, symmetry and agility and elegance all at once, the flrelight flickering off the strong planes of his face. It only stands to reason that Kyuhyun should stand up halfway through his dance and reach out to stop him in his tracks, and Hankyung’s still breathing hard from exertion when Kyuhyun kisses him again, thin lanky form moulding to Hankyung’s lean, stronger one, fingers slipping on Hankyung’s sweaty skin.
___
“I think I love you,” Hankyung whispers against his skin later that night, his breath hot and his hands and lips sensuous over the planes of Kyuhyun’s body.
“Love?” Kyuhyun says breathlessly. “What’s that?”
“I’ll show you,” Hankyung says. “I’ll tell you everyday, and show you everyday, until you know what it is, and you can tell me in return.”
Kyuhyun gasps slightly and arches his head back as Hankyung drags his tongue across his neck, rough and wet and with the slightest hint of teeth. “If I say that I don’t regret leaving the Inside, that I’m willing to stay on the Outside with you, that you make me happier than I’ve ever been, is that love?”
Hankyung finds his lips again and kisses him hungrily, swallowing his gasps. “It is,” he murmurs, and Kyuhyun wraps his arms around his neck.
“Then I love you,” he whispers into Hankyung’s mouth, and feels him smile, soft lips curving into crescents like his eyes.
Title: No Boundaries
Pairing: Hankyung/Kyuhyun
Rating: PG-13
Word count: 4,033
Summary: Kyuhyun’s lived in a protected glass dome all his life, safe from the terrors of the outside world. But when he meets a person from there, it forces him to rethink everything that he knows.
A/N: Written for dragons_desire, who asked for a future/post-apocalyptic AU in the SuJu Secret Santa Exchange, original post here. Merry Christmas! ♥ I wrote another fic for the exchange when someone else backed out on their Santee, but I'll post that tomorrow so I won't flood my f-list, haha.
I'm also using this for the 100 Challenge, Theme #37, Rotation. (ROFL I am so lazy.)
___
Ever since he was a child, Kyuhyun’s been told that the Outside is a bad place.
The Inside, where he lives along with the rest of the civilized world’s population of 250,000, is home to Kyuhyun, and all he ever knows. It’s a beautiful world, Kyuhyun always thinks, the weather and temperature carefully regulated by turbines, everything bright and clean and perfectly manicured, surrounded by a glass dome that keeps everyone safe from the hostile Outside.
When Kyuhyun was still in school, he’d been taught that centuries ago, there’d been a war, something terrible that devastated the planet and forced the few remaining thousands of people left into this glass dome. It had originally been much smaller and then enlarged over the years, dome encasing dome encasing dome until it’d grown to its current size. The conditions Outside are terrible, Kyuhyun’s told; volcanoes that never stop erupting, temperatures that fluctuate between freezing, biting cold to scorching hot in the course of a single day, and everything is arid and dry and bleak.
And then of course, there are the Outsiders.
They are the people, Kyuhyun had been taught, who had been left behind when most of the world retreated to the Inside; people who either weren’t allowed in, because of physical deformities (and Kyuhyun can’t grasp the idea of deformities because everywhere he looks in the Inside, people are created to fit in, to be perfect perfect perfect), or people who refused to enter. Kyuhyun’s never really told why these others had refused to come in, but he wonders why there were people who would choose to remain Outside, where it’s dangerous and inhospitable and people have to scrounge off the dead barren soil for a mere mouthful.
He still can’t help thinking, though, that it’ll be nice to see the Outside, just once. Just to stand out there and feel the wind on his face, wind that isn’t created by a person manning a weather system, or see what the sky really looks like beneath the artificial blue and star-speckled black of the dome. He never tells anyone about this though. It won’t do for an Insider to not conform in thought, word, and deed. Conformity means stability, and that’s something the Outside doesn’t have.
___
Kyuhyun’s home is located near the Border, the single gate that connects the Inside to the Outside, and he likes to wander near it, just to stare at the night sky through the glass, and wonder how it manages to look the same as it does on the Inside. Where are the fiery skies of red and black sooty ash that his teachers had always mentioned? And there aren’t miles of cracked, dry ground as far as the eye can see; in fact, while the ground Outside isn’t covered in lush greenery like the Inside is, it’s just - plain and boring, and grassy, with even some shrubs dotted here and there.
The more Kyuhyun sees of the Outside, the more he starts wondering if everything he’s been taught is true. He thinks on this for a few minutes each day before the mental self-censorship, ingrained from years of classes where he’s told that Inside is good, Outside is bad and We do not question, we only obey, kicks in, and he forces himself to think less.
He remembers his teachers always saying, with resigned shakes of their heads, that Kyuhyun will never make a good Insider, because he always thinks too much, questions too much, makes his teachers and fellow Insiders uncomfortable. He remembers thinking, too, that even though no one ever says it, that they probably think something went wrong with his Creation, when he was made, and that’s why he doesn’t blend in with everyone else. It’s not the first time the geneticists at the Creation Laboratory would have messed up with embryos when they’re created, anyway, and occasionally there’ll be people like Kyuhyun, people who don’t conform, who cause instability.
He knows for sure that he’s considered as one of those people when he’s gently informed, upon finishing school, that there’s no need for him to work - when all his peers are assigned jobs according to their talents and abilities, jobs that facilitate the smooth running and continued prosperity of the Inside. Instead, he’s given a house near the Border, suitably far from the city centre, and monthly state handouts, and left to his own devices.
It’s no different from being thrown to the Outside, Kyuhyun feels. But then when he wanders to the Border, walks along it as he trails fingers along the cold glass wall, he finds that being by himself can be good. He has all the time and freedom to think about anything he wants, anything at all.
___
It’s on one of his nightly walks near the Border when he sees an Outsider for the first time.
He normally doesn't see much Outside, because the lights from the Inside blaze so brightly, even at night, that he can't look out. He catches a glimpse of movement though, enough to catch his attention, and as he moves closer to the glass, a face suddenly looms out of the darkness, making him start and jump back, and it disappears as quickly as it had appeared, though Kyuhyun can just make out the Outsider's silhouette as it moves further away from the glass.
He’s breathing heavily and his hands are shaking, because he remembers all too well what his teachers had said about Outsiders, that they’re cold-blooded savages who have no one to guide and lead them like the Insiders have, people who grow up wild on the Outside and who are envious of the beautiful Inside and all the people in here. He also remembers that they were always warned never to try to communicate with any Outsiders they see, because Outsiders wouldn't hesitate to butcher an Insider, and Insiders are all calm and peace-loving, and wouldn't be able to defend themselves.
These thoughts run swiftly through Kyuhyun's mind, but he can't forget the look on the Outsider's face, a look that he’s fairly certain mirrors the fear on his own face. He doesn't understand why a fierce, wild Outsider would be afraid of a defenceless Insider like him. It piques Kyuhyun's curiosity, though he knows better than to tell anyone Inside what he'd seen, and all the questions about Outsiders he’s dying to ask. Curiosity, he knows, isn't a trait that was much valued on the Inside.
And then he realizes: this is an advantage of being left alone, because he can do whatever he wants.
___
Kyuhyun begins seeing that Outsider almost every night from then.
It always starts off like the first time they'd seen each other; Kyuhyun will be walking along the Border, and there’ll be a movement off to his left, and when he turns, he'll see that Outsider, pressed against the glass, looking in, and both of them will jump before the Outsider will turn and leave, disappearing into the blackness of the plains outside.
The fourteenth, or maybe fifteenth time Kyuhyun sees the Outsider, he doesn’t jump. He steps forward, hesitantly at first, and the Outsider shrinks back, but before he can turn away Kyuhyun reaches out and places his hand on the glass.
This close, Kyuhyun can clearly see the look of shock that crosses the Outsider’s face, and if he’s to be honest with himself he’s scared, too; years and years of repression and obedience, pared down to this, his hand on the Border and waiting for a response from an Outsider. But more than the fear, Kyuhyun wants to know, wants to learn, wants to feel something other than what the Inside, always sanitary and orderly and perfect, can give him.
He’s concentrating so hard on trying to slow his thumping heart that he almost doesn’t see it when the Outsider lifts a hand slowly and puts it against the glass, right where Kyuhyun’s hand is, and as Kyuhyun stares at it he fancies that he can feel the warmth of the Outsider’s hand, traveling straight through the six inches of the special glass-and-plastic alloy that makes up the Border, into his own hand and body.
Then the Outsider smiles, and Kyuhyun blinks, because that smile transforms his entire face, makes his eyes crinkle attractively at the corners and his whole countenance soften. The Outsider curls his fingers slightly, and so does Kyuhyun, and before he knows it, he’s smiling too.
Kyuhyun’s never thought that this barest minimum of contact with the Outside can be so fulfilling.
___
It’s the closest thing Kyuhyun’s ever had to a proper friendship, glass barrier notwithstanding; he finds himself heading to the Border everyday, settling himself crosslegged on the lush grass carpet in front of the Barrier, shielding his eyes from the sunlight Outside that streams in to blend with the artificial light on the Inside, waiting for the Outsider. He’s always there soon enough, sometimes even before Kyuhyun arrives, and he sits down just like Kyuhyun does, except that the ground he sits on is bare and the soil is loose and crumbling.
Now that they meet during the day, Kyuhyun can see that the Outsider looks just like any Insider does, with the same skin, same four limbs, same everything. His clothes are simple and archaic, compared to what Insiders normally wear, but they fit him nicely, the indeterminate fabric at his legs tight and accentuating little swells of muscle that Kyuhyun finds himself fixating on. He’s wearing only a single layer on top that Kyuhyun can see, the cutting and design unfamiliar to Kyuhyun, and he tugs self-consciously at the collar of his polyester garment, the artificial fibres suddenly uncomfortable against his skin. But above all, his clothes look normal, he looks normal, nothing at all like the wild-eyed, shaggy-haired savage dressed in the skins of people they’ve killed, unlike what he’s been imagining all his life.
They smile at each other a lot, sometimes pressing fingers to the glass and laughing when their fingers leave smudges that magically disappear after a few seconds, the material of the Border always maintaining its pristine appearance. Sometimes the Outsider swipes quick strokes across the glass, forming shapes and symbols that slowly dissolve, and it takes Kyuhyun a while before he realizes that the Outsider’s trying to write messages to him, but they vanish too quickly for him to pick anything up.
Kyuhyun hits on the idea of trying to speak to the Outsider after a frustrating hour in which both of them scrawl messages on the glass, which disappear all too soon, and even though Kyuhyun still isn’t certain if they even speak or write the same language (that’s something the teachers back in school never did mention, he recalls ruefully), he tries it out by mouthing a simple, Hello.
The Outsider’s eyes widen and he cocks his head to the side, and Kyuhyun tries again, moving his lips carefully and slowly. Can you understand me?
There’s a few seconds of tension, and then the Outsider’s face splits into a wide grin, and he nods, mouthing in return, Yes, yes.
Kyuhyun feels a prickle of excitement run down his spine - more than a prickle; goosebumps are rising on his arms despite the balmy warmth of the Inside and his palms are sweaty and there’s a lump in his throat that he can’t swallow away, because as far as he knows, he’s the first Insider in centuries to speak to an Outsider.
What’s your name? he asks, almost shaking in his excitement.
It takes several times before he can read what the Outsider says, but when he catches it, he says it out loud, tests the name on his tongue. “Hankyung,” he says, the syllables not at all unfamiliar. “Hankyung,” he repeats, and the Outsider smiles and nods.
___
I’ve always wanted to go Outside, Kyuhyun tells Hankyung one day.
Hankyung’s playing with bits of grass on the Outside, kicking disconsolately with his boots at the Border as if he wants nothing more than to trample it down, but he stops when he reads what Kyuhyun’s said. Really?
Yeah, really.
Hankyung laughs, and Kyuhyun imagines - wishes - that he can hear his laugh, hear his voice. Why? Don’t you always tell me how comfortable it is Inside?
Kyuhyun shifts so that he’s leaning sideways against the glass, his body making an imprint against the material, and Hankyung moves so he can lean against the glass as well, against Kyuhyun. I don’t know, he says, careful to turn his head so Hankyung can see him speak. I just feel like there’s nothing for me here, really.
And there’s something for you on the Outside?
Kyuhyun stops to think. He thinks of all that he’s learned on the Inside, all that he’s felt. He thinks of how he’s lived his life, ostracized by everyone else because he’s a possible cause of instability, thrown out alone near the Border, a drain on state resources. He thinks of how he’s always challenged everything he’s been taught and told, how he’s wanted to break out of the suffocating expectations placed on him to be someone he’s not. He thinks about how absolutely unfair it is that all these happened to him, simply because some geneticist forgot to give him a certain enzyme or didn’t splice his cells correctly when he was an embryo, and because of that, he’s not a robot like the rest, passive and obedient and content with their lot, and he has to shoulder the stigma of being a threat to the carefully-maintained society the Inside’s built on.
Most of all he thinks about Hankyung, and how Hankyung has given him more happiness and contentment in a month than he’s had in 21 years Inside.
There is something very important to me Outside, he tells Hankyung at last. Something that I wouldn’t mind leaving the Inside and everything here for.
Hankyung’s smiling at him as he says it, that soft smile that makes Kyuhyun’s breath catch in his throat as Hankyung’s eyes curve into perfect half-moons. I’ll dance for you when come Outside, he says.
You dance?
Hankyung nods. I do, he says, and Kyuhyun imagines Hankyung in his mind, all beautifully sculpted muscles and pure control, spinning and whirling with spellbinding grace, and it takes his breath away even in his mind. He leans his cheek against the glass, and sees Hankyung do the same from the corner of his eye.
___
Tell me about the Outside, he demands of Hankyung one day, and Hankyung looks astonished at his question.
Don’t they tell you how it’s like? he asks, and Kyuhyun frowns, because yes they’ve told him, only he isn’t sure if it’s the truth.
I want to hear it from you, he says, and Hankyung, as always, gives in to him without question.
He watches Hankyung’s lips carefully, feeling lost in the multitude of words that are so strange and foreign to him, words like government (the concept doesn’t exist in a society that’s presided over by a single Controller), nuclear weapons (a peaceful, loving society needs no weapons, he’s been told), and birth and parents (in Kyuhyun’s world, there are only the geneticists who grow embryos, there is only a Creation, and children are cared for by teachers until they begin work in their pre-assigned jobs).
That’s also how Kyuhyun learns that everything he’s been told by the Insiders are lies, because those hundreds of years ago, after the war that killed most of the world’s population, a handful of people, who would later become the predecessors of all the 250,000 people currently living on the Inside, retreated inside the glass dome they’d had commissioned before the war began, and barred entry to everyone else.
Wait, Kyuhyun says. They prepared the dome before the war started?
Hankyung’s face is somber as he nods, eyes searching Kyuhyun’s face as light begins to dawn on Kyuhyun.
The Insiders caused the war, didn’t they, he says quietly, and Hankyung nods again.
Kyuhyun feels fury rising up in him, such as he’s never felt before, imagining the elaborate cloak of lies they’ve constructed, passing it on generation after generation, and finally to him. And they chose to save themselves, and not anyone else?
Yes, Hankyung says. But some people survived outside, and those are our ancestors. And it’s been centuries, Kyuhyun, centuries without machines or wars or pollution, and the planet has been recovering. It’s not all doom and gloom out here. It’s not all ash and smog and unbreathable air and starvation.
Kyuhyun looks at Hankyung, at his animated face, the brightness of his expression, and yearns for that same happiness, the same freedom that Hankyung has Outside, and suddenly he wants nothing more than to be able to step on real soil, breathe real air, and hold Hankyung’s hand in his without this stupid barrier between them.
I want to go Outside, he says with newfound determination, and Hankyung unfolds himself from the ground, grit falling from his pants, all long lean limbs and lithe gracefulness with every movement.
I’ll be here, is all he says.
___
The Border is always open from the Inside, Kyuhyun knows. Anyone Inside can step out anytime they wish, but the problem is, it isn’t accessible from the Outside, so once someone leaves, they can never come back.
Kyuhyun steps up to the retina scanner mounted on the gate of the Border, and he’s shaking so hard that he has to realign himself several times with it before it can scan his iris properly.
His fingers are shaking, too, when he’s prompted to press the green button for ‘Yes’ or red for ‘No’, and they slip off the button several times before he manages to depress it, and the sound of the gate clicking open sends tremors through his body.
But he pushes the gate open and stands in the gateway for a moment, trembling as a cool breeze from the Outside strokes past his face, and it feels and smells so different from the inside - more earthy, more rich, more real. And for a second his resolve wavers, and he almost turns to step back in, but he remembers Hankyung, and how he’d promised Kyuhyun he’d be there, and Kyuhyun steps out completely, letting go of the gate.
It clangs shut behind him, the sound resonating with dull finality in Kyuhyun’s ears.
He’s still shivering when he turns to face the wide vastness of the Outside, but he sees Hankyung in the distance running towards him, running with a broad grin on his face. He almost cries, except he doesn’t because Hankyung has reached him, and it’s all he can do to collapse against him, his legs unable to hold him anymore.
But Hankyung does.
___
Hankyung doesn’t live near the Border, as Kyuhyun expects; he lives in a proper city further inland, a place not unlike the Inside according to Hankyung’s descriptions, except perhaps less modern, because “we’ve learned our lesson, machines aren’t necessary for survival”, as Hankyung puts it. But he has a tent, bivouacked some miles from the Border, because Hankyung, much like Kyuhyun with the Outside, has always had a fascination with the Inside and the Insiders, and used to explore the Border frequently.
“And then?” Kyuhyun asks as they walk together to his tent, still marveling at the feel of rough grit under the soles of his cloth shoes, suitable for artificial grass and carpet but not the raw ground of the Outside; Hankyung’s promised to make him clothes and boots, and Kyuhyun finds himself fascinated by the thought of Hankyung’s nimble fingers fashioning things that will be draped onto him.
“And then I found you,” is all Hankyung says, almost casually, and it isn’t really an answer to Kyuhyun’s question, but he’s too distracted by the fact that he can now hear Hankyung, his accent unfamiliar and different from what Kyuhyun’s used to but still somehow enchanting, and that he can now feel him as well, as he demonstrates by taking Kyuhyun’s hand as they walk.
Kyuhyun squeezes him tightly, stumbling a little over uneven ground that he’s not used to, Hankyung’s hand warm and callused in his and so, so different from touching it through a glass barrier.
___
Kyuhyun’s still amazed at everything he sees after a month, from the sight of Hankyung’s hunting rifle to the books he has, about things Kyuhyun’s never heard of before like religion, philosophy, history. He devours the books Hankyung has in his tent, exclaiming at every sentence and asking questions often. Hankyung laughs at him sometimes, and he snaps back at Hankyung, but at night they wrap themselves in blankets against the chilly air, so different from the teperature-controlled Inside, but so much better with Hankyung’s warm body pressed against his.
It’s their end of their first month together when Hankyung builds a fire outside the tent at night so he can grill slices of meat for both of them, carved off a boar he’d shot himself. Kyuhyun’s never even seen a wild boar before today, all the food on the Inside made from a complex scientific process that produces packages of nutritious but boring mush, but the moment Hankyung feeds him the first slice he knows, for certain, that he doesn’t regret leaving the Inside.
He’s full to bursting when he leans back on the rocky soil, tucking his arms behind his head and staring up at the night sky, bursting with stars and so, so much prettier than the artificial one the Inside creates, and he thinks it’s amazing how 21 years of teaching can melt away just like this, until he can spread himself out on the ground of the place he’s always been taught to fear. “How was it?” Hankyung wants to know, beaming, and Kyuhyun opens his mouth to answer but he remembers something else.
“Dance for me, Hankyung,” he says, and Hankyung, who’s about to settle himself next to Kyuhyun, stills.
“You want me to?” he says in a hushed voice, as if not quite daring to believe it.
“You said you would,” Kyuhyun says, sitting up and staring at him.
Hankyung smiles. “So I did,” he replies, and Kyuhyun, hardly able to help himself, leans forward and kisses him impulsively.
“Dance for me,” he repeats against Hankyung’s lips, every movement sending frissons down his spine, and Hankyung’s hands are on his arms, his hips, pulling him closer. “Dance for me,” he says, and Hankyung pulls back.
“I will,” he promises.
___
Hankyung is almost like beauty personified as he whirls around Kyuhyun in tight circles, balance in every limb from the tips of his fingers to his pointed toes, symmetry and agility and elegance all at once, the flrelight flickering off the strong planes of his face. It only stands to reason that Kyuhyun should stand up halfway through his dance and reach out to stop him in his tracks, and Hankyung’s still breathing hard from exertion when Kyuhyun kisses him again, thin lanky form moulding to Hankyung’s lean, stronger one, fingers slipping on Hankyung’s sweaty skin.
___
“I think I love you,” Hankyung whispers against his skin later that night, his breath hot and his hands and lips sensuous over the planes of Kyuhyun’s body.
“Love?” Kyuhyun says breathlessly. “What’s that?”
“I’ll show you,” Hankyung says. “I’ll tell you everyday, and show you everyday, until you know what it is, and you can tell me in return.”
Kyuhyun gasps slightly and arches his head back as Hankyung drags his tongue across his neck, rough and wet and with the slightest hint of teeth. “If I say that I don’t regret leaving the Inside, that I’m willing to stay on the Outside with you, that you make me happier than I’ve ever been, is that love?”
Hankyung finds his lips again and kisses him hungrily, swallowing his gasps. “It is,” he murmurs, and Kyuhyun wraps his arms around his neck.
“Then I love you,” he whispers into Hankyung’s mouth, and feels him smile, soft lips curving into crescents like his eyes.