[wip] you knew you were breakable: cxk/wzy

[rhodochrosite]

[cxk nascent godhood au originally prompted by noura... cxk starts growing into his powers, notices reality warping around him, freaks out etc... would have had side jiazheng + dream cxk selfcest. i think i cannibalised part of this fic in yuletide bodyswap fic but umm yeah]


//

Longing is a collapsing star in the middle of his chest.

//

If he doesn’t look at his hands he can pretend they’re both still there.

//

 

Zhengting props his leg up against the railing of the top bunk, effortlessly leaning forward into a perfect vertical split.

“Was there something you wanted,” Xukun says.

 

“Nope,” Zhengting says cheerfully. “Just here to bother you.”

 

“Thanks for being upfront about it, at least.”

 

“Anytime.”
 

 

The ensuing silence is not exactly comfortable, but Xukun waits him out.

 

“Is your waist still bothering you?” he asks.

 

“It’s fine,” Zhengting says. The lie curls dark and bitter under Xukun’s tongue, though it’s not unexpected; Zhengting is too stubborn to ever admit to losing a battle, least of all one against himself. Xukun can feel a phantom of the ache, muted, humming beneath the skin of his waist like an old injury of his own.

 

The other day Yanjun had woken up unable to make any sound louder than a croak, and he’d spent the morning at the kitchen table miserably downing the steaming mugs of honey lemon water Zhengting and Zhangjing were taking it in turns to ply him with. Xukun could feel that, too, a dull pain prickling at his throat, the cells fevered, split apart. Each slim needlelike strand of the virus that had taken up residence there. He shut his eyes. Imagined the process in reverse, the infection folding back in on itself, shrivelling into nothing. The pain easing.

 

Yanjun set a hand to his throat. His eyebrows flew upwards. “Funny,” he said. His voice perfectly restored. “It just—went away?”

 

If Xukun concentrates now he can make out the faint heat of the inflamed tissue beneath the muscle patch he knows Zhengting is wearing under his shirt. His fingers tighten against his knee. It’s easier this time, drawing the knot of pain out, smoothing over the muscle fibres, letting the heat dissipate.

 

//

 

getting something for nothing isn’t the way the world is supposed to work. Surely all of this will come back to bite him eventually—the alternative is even more terrifying in its implications.

 

//

 

Zhengting is looking at Minghao

//
 

[cxk makes something and then feels sick]

 

One moment he’s idly considering the

the next there’s a peach resting on his knee

 

 

“Is that a peach?” Linong’s voice is shirred with sleep. There’s only a perfunctory curiosity to his words. “It’s not peach season…”

 

“Yeah, I gave up on questioning how Chengcheng manages to procure anything in this household. Remember how he turned up with ten mangoes last month and wouldn’t tell us where he got them from?” This is a genuine mystery.
Chengcheng maintains strict tight-lipped secrecy on the matter; not even Minghao or Linkai have been able to bribe an explanation out of him.

 

Linong laughs good-naturedly, halfway to a yawn. “Right, it’s like the world just bends to give him what he wants… Are there any peaches left?”

 

“Sorry,” Xukun says. “I took the last one.”

 

“You’re lucky Chengcheng shares with you,” Linong says. “I reckon I’d have to go through Zhengting to get anything out of him.”

 

“I—don’t think that’s true,” Xukun says.

//

 

Lying to himself comes so naturally now it’s more reflexive than truth. __. His hands don’t disintegrate when he isn’t paying attention to them. He isn’t in love with Wang Ziyi.

//

 

“You good there, leader?”

 

//
 

“Easy,” Ziyi says.
 

 

//
 

 

“You can’t get something from nothing, right?” Xukun says, a little desperately. The reflection hums, neither assent nor dissent. “Won’t this—everything I’m, we’re doing, won’t it have, like, consequences or something?”

 

“Why should it?” the reflection says. “Do you want it to?”

 

“Yes—well, obviously no, but—”

 

“If you want there to be consequences you can set them,” the reflection says. “Otherwise—there’s no limits. None at all.

The only person who’s ever been able to stop you is yourself.

 

//
 

Ziyi just hums. Lifts one of Xukun’s hands and presses his mouth to his wrist, right over where his pulse point should be. Blood rising to the surface, sweet as an old bruise. Sharp like longing.