Now that he's here standing over him, Junghyeok is at a loss. Where do you even start with something like this? So he stares, taking in what he can as if the answers were that easy to divine. There's been a shift here, physically he looks the same, but there's something more now.
Before he even realises it, he sinks down to his knees. He's so tired of it all and this man knew better than anyone everything he carried. Companion, incarnation, character, a reason to live. Tell him, what were they?
Dokja is the one who always has an answer, or a clever turn of phrase, to cover the oppressive silence. Uncharacteristically, he's silent as Junghyeok sinks to his knees, exhaustion bearing down on him.
Dokja doesn't hesitate when he gets the urge to reach out, curling his hand into Junghyeok's hair and resting his hand against the side of his face. He lets his thumb rub against several strands of hair, nudging them back and forth.
Dokja's expression isn't concerned, or pitying. It's not even knowing; it's just sad, looking over the scars that cut through part of Junghyeok's face.
"My friend," he finally says gently. "It's good to see you again."
Edited (a day later, an edit bc im insane) 2025-09-15 04:03 (UTC)
This is a level of intimacy he rarely experienced and even then Junghyeok barely notices it. It registers at the same level as the awareness of feel of the clothes he's wearing. Even looking blankly at Dokja doesn't change anything. Perhaps it had always meant to be this easy with the one presence that had seen through everything with him.
Dokja's words slowly trickle through the static in his head that makes everything feel just out of reach.
Friend.
It felt like such a small word. But then again could anything truly convey everything between them? Unbidden, Suyeong's words come to mind. It wasn't the story that kept Dokja going, but him.
"It's been long enough," he acknowledges. He recalls a line in the extended story about Junghyeok recalling his 0th round; this is clearly before such a thing happened, though. Finding out the truth for Junghyeok still took 1865 long, long rounds.
On his end, he's been parted from the nebula for some time - long enough to feel like years and years for Dokja. He's witnessed each of those rounds, and some of the ones left unwritten.
Dokja takes a deep breath, intending to offer to answer Junghyeok's questions - but instead he finds himself shifting forward, off of the couch, until he's kneeling in front of the protagonist, knee to knee. He hesitates, and then wraps his arms around Junghyeok in an embrace.
"Thank you," he says, his voice small. "I know you said I don't owe you anything but knowing you - getting to really know you - made me happy."
As Dokja puts his arms around him Junghyeok doesn't resist or pull away. But his face once out of Dokja's view falls.
This is the man that knows more about him than anyone else, perhaps even more than the mysterious writer of that accursed novel. To know someone so deeply yet so removed and to still be happy to see him in the flesh... He couldn't imagine that everything was worth watching and reading. Or any of it really. He's done nothing but fail for a long time and the best stories were always about triumphing over impossible odds.
"Will you allow me the same opportunity?"
Junghyeok thought he knew Dokja once, but had been proven wrong. There was always something he held back. Slowly he lifts his head up and presses their foreheads together.
To be known is to open yourself to being hurt. Dokja's avoided it for a long time for precisely that reason, even as he enjoyed the company of the nebula. Even as he protected both his incarnations and struggled with them.
He lets out a breath, for half a moment, and then laughs softly as Junghyeok presses their foreheads together.
"You drive a difficult bargain," he says, but the smile on his face shows that he's teasing him ever so slightly. "I am done running, though. So I suppose I accept it."
Junghyeok doesn't know of his final act yet, nor has he lived through the consequences. Dokja's making a promise he can't keep back home - but here, he can try.
One of his arms shifts, his hand finding Junghyeok's. He doesn't take it in his own, but rather brushes his fingers against the back of it.
At this point he's seen Dokja say one thing and do something else enough times that Junghyeok's inherently sceptical of any easy acquiescence on his part. It would be his actions later that showed the truth and he's willing to extend the opportunity to prove himself.
"I do." He has more questions than he can voice. There's so many figuring out where to start was a scenario in itself. He watches Dokja brush his fingers against his as he attempts to sort through it all.
Dokja doesn't press for Junghyeok to seize a question right away. He waits for it, and of course he picks a difficult one.
"It sounds strange, but I had only just discovered it was me. The Oldest Dream doesn't experience time in a... linear fashion," Dokja says, parsing out his words in a way that he hopes makes sense.
"As for why here and now - I may not get a chance to, back home," he admits guiltily.
That had to be a record for a Dokja reveal. He usually doesn't do the reveals until after it was too late so that did align with what he was saying here and also how Suyeong had been acting.
"She said I choose to regress again." His expression hardens and he grabs Dokja's jaw to prevent him from looking away. "Did you waste my sacrifice?"
Dokja's surprised by the grab to his jaw, his own expression giving away only the firm tilt of his mouth.
"You didn't regress alone," he points out mulishly. To explain the situation, though, requires more than that, and Dokja's gaze flickers to the side.
"The Oldest Dream maintains the star stream's powers, and his gaze keeps the worldlines from fading away. Without him, we had nothing keeping us from becoming a memory."
"So I used Suyeong's Avatar skill to split; 49% of myself, all my memories I made with all of you. I sent him home with the Nebula. The rest stayed with me."
He grimaces. "But you figured it out, and then Suyeong did as well."
He thinks he is nothing but a memory, imagination made flesh by the desperate dreams of this man. It wouldn't be much of a loss to return. It would be better than to continue on pointlessly.
"Did you really think we would be satisfied with only a fragment?" It was a given that he would have figured it out, Dokja was more than just his companion. "All dreams have to end one day."
Not that he wanted to fade away, but Junghyeok knew better than anyone that if death had no meaning neither did life.
"The dream wouldn't end - that's not how it works."
It's hard to explain, how a fading story becomes an Outer God. Dokja tries anyway.
"It's like Samsara. Suyeong writes Three Ways, I read Three Ways, you become reality. But your reality is what makes Suyeong write the story for me, and I become your sponsor because I saw the 0th turn. There's no way to separate it all, and if it stops, the story wants one of them - the protagonist, the reader, or the author. It will consume other stories if it has to."
After saying that, he adds, voice quieter, "I wanted to be there with you all."
Things Junghyeok did not know prior: all of that. Everything Dokja has said is a new revelation. Some things will slowly slot into place later, but one thing stands out now.
She knew. She knew exactly how much he hated being lied to and decided to join in on it.
Betrayal, rage and an undercurrent of hurt was a familiar combination. She had no right to withhold that from him.
He bolts upright, immediately putting some distance between them. "Am I just a puppet to you two?"
For a moment Dokja's fingers catch on Junghyeok's wrist, a reflexive action - but it's barely enough to feel before he stops, letting Junghyeok put the space between him.
"You're not a puppet," Kim Dokja insists, an intense look on his face as he curls his hand into a fist on his leg.
"I told you - I didn't remember until it had happened. She wouldn't have known until she wrote it, which was during the 1865th."
It has been a long time, puppet of the Oldest Dream.
He was tied inextricably to this man, what else was he if not that? Even an Outer World God knew it. He's done nothing but walk on a path someone else had planned out for him. First hers through that accursed book and then Dokja's in an attempt to change things.
"She knew already. She's already written it."
Whatever tiny leeway Junghyeok's acceptance that Dokja hadn't known until now means little in the sheer face of everything else kept from him again.
Despite all the new information, he's still Dokja at the end of the day. His expression twists slightly, then he shakes his head.
"Then you know there's not anything she can do to change it at this point. She wrote what had already happened."
She's trying to change my ending, he wants to say, but he doesn't add it at the moment. He knows this conversation is probably going to end soon; Junghyeok needs time to absorb all this information.
Suyeong's motivations matter far less to him than what Dokja is thinking. He understands being backed into a corner by the situation, what he infuriates him however is keeping him in the dark about it all. It was quite literally his life. It didn't matter if it he really was in his third round and hadn't lived it yet or his 1864th and she wrote about things that had already happened.
"I still deserved to know."
If he meant anything to them they would have. He turns to leave because to stay meant he'd do something he'd regret later.
"Watch someone else." Junghyeok knows the futility of saying this, but he has nothing else. The only things left to him are his words and they've never been his strong suit.
Dokja sighs a little bit, but tries to keep it muffled. He won't tell Junghyeok he hasn't been watching him; he won't believe it, he's sure. Apologies will fall on deaf ears.
"I'll be here if you have any other questions."
It's not quite a dismissal, because Junghyeok will leave anyway.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no subject
Before he even realises it, he sinks down to his knees. He's so tired of it all and this man knew better than anyone everything he carried. Companion, incarnation, character, a reason to live. Tell him, what were they?
no subject
Dokja doesn't hesitate when he gets the urge to reach out, curling his hand into Junghyeok's hair and resting his hand against the side of his face. He lets his thumb rub against several strands of hair, nudging them back and forth.
Dokja's expression isn't concerned, or pitying. It's not even knowing; it's just sad, looking over the scars that cut through part of Junghyeok's face.
"My friend," he finally says gently. "It's good to see you again."
no subject
Dokja's words slowly trickle through the static in his head that makes everything feel just out of reach.
Friend.
It felt like such a small word. But then again could anything truly convey everything between them? Unbidden, Suyeong's words come to mind. It wasn't the story that kept Dokja going, but him.
"It hasn't been that long."
no subject
On his end, he's been parted from the nebula for some time - long enough to feel like years and years for Dokja. He's witnessed each of those rounds, and some of the ones left unwritten.
Dokja takes a deep breath, intending to offer to answer Junghyeok's questions - but instead he finds himself shifting forward, off of the couch, until he's kneeling in front of the protagonist, knee to knee. He hesitates, and then wraps his arms around Junghyeok in an embrace.
"Thank you," he says, his voice small. "I know you said I don't owe you anything but knowing you - getting to really know you - made me happy."
no subject
This is the man that knows more about him than anyone else, perhaps even more than the mysterious writer of that accursed novel. To know someone so deeply yet so removed and to still be happy to see him in the flesh... He couldn't imagine that everything was worth watching and reading. Or any of it really. He's done nothing but fail for a long time and the best stories were always about triumphing over impossible odds.
"Will you allow me the same opportunity?"
Junghyeok thought he knew Dokja once, but had been proven wrong. There was always something he held back. Slowly he lifts his head up and presses their foreheads together.
"Don't run away again."
no subject
He lets out a breath, for half a moment, and then laughs softly as Junghyeok presses their foreheads together.
"You drive a difficult bargain," he says, but the smile on his face shows that he's teasing him ever so slightly. "I am done running, though. So I suppose I accept it."
Junghyeok doesn't know of his final act yet, nor has he lived through the consequences. Dokja's making a promise he can't keep back home - but here, he can try.
One of his arms shifts, his hand finding Junghyeok's. He doesn't take it in his own, but rather brushes his fingers against the back of it.
"You must have many questions."
no subject
"I do." He has more questions than he can voice. There's so many figuring out where to start was a scenario in itself. He watches Dokja brush his fingers against his as he attempts to sort through it all.
"Why now?"
no subject
"It sounds strange, but I had only just discovered it was me. The Oldest Dream doesn't experience time in a... linear fashion," Dokja says, parsing out his words in a way that he hopes makes sense.
"As for why here and now - I may not get a chance to, back home," he admits guiltily.
no subject
"She said I choose to regress again." His expression hardens and he grabs Dokja's jaw to prevent him from looking away. "Did you waste my sacrifice?"
no subject
"You didn't regress alone," he points out mulishly. To explain the situation, though, requires more than that, and Dokja's gaze flickers to the side.
"The Oldest Dream maintains the star stream's powers, and his gaze keeps the worldlines from fading away. Without him, we had nothing keeping us from becoming a memory."
"So I used Suyeong's Avatar skill to split; 49% of myself, all my memories I made with all of you. I sent him home with the Nebula. The rest stayed with me."
He grimaces. "But you figured it out, and then Suyeong did as well."
no subject
"Did you really think we would be satisfied with only a fragment?" It was a given that he would have figured it out, Dokja was more than just his companion. "All dreams have to end one day."
Not that he wanted to fade away, but Junghyeok knew better than anyone that if death had no meaning neither did life.
no subject
It's hard to explain, how a fading story becomes an Outer God. Dokja tries anyway.
"It's like Samsara. Suyeong writes Three Ways, I read Three Ways, you become reality. But your reality is what makes Suyeong write the story for me, and I become your sponsor because I saw the 0th turn. There's no way to separate it all, and if it stops, the story wants one of them - the protagonist, the reader, or the author. It will consume other stories if it has to."
After saying that, he adds, voice quieter, "I wanted to be there with you all."
no subject
She knew. She knew exactly how much he hated being lied to and decided to join in on it.
Betrayal, rage and an undercurrent of hurt was a familiar combination. She had no right to withhold that from him.
He bolts upright, immediately putting some distance between them. "Am I just a puppet to you two?"
no subject
"You're not a puppet," Kim Dokja insists, an intense look on his face as he curls his hand into a fist on his leg.
"I told you - I didn't remember until it had happened. She wouldn't have known until she wrote it, which was during the 1865th."
no subject
He was tied inextricably to this man, what else was he if not that? Even an Outer World God knew it. He's done nothing but walk on a path someone else had planned out for him. First hers through that accursed book and then Dokja's in an attempt to change things.
"She knew already. She's already written it."
Whatever tiny leeway Junghyeok's acceptance that Dokja hadn't known until now means little in the sheer face of everything else kept from him again.
no subject
"Then you know there's not anything she can do to change it at this point. She wrote what had already happened."
She's trying to change my ending, he wants to say, but he doesn't add it at the moment. He knows this conversation is probably going to end soon; Junghyeok needs time to absorb all this information.
no subject
"I still deserved to know."
If he meant anything to them they would have. He turns to leave because to stay meant he'd do something he'd regret later.
"Watch someone else." Junghyeok knows the futility of saying this, but he has nothing else. The only things left to him are his words and they've never been his strong suit.
no subject
"I'll be here if you have any other questions."
It's not quite a dismissal, because Junghyeok will leave anyway.