A flicker.
Not on the ice. In his mind.
One blink—and the ice was a tiled rooftop, slick with rain. A figure—half-masked, laughing—leapt across it with a fox’s grace and a soldier’s speed. Golden blue robes. Blood at the corners of his mouth. A hand outstretched, taunting. Familiar.
Another blink—and now it was a battlefield. Snow steaming off scorched ground. Fire curling at the hem of a standard. And there he was again. That same boy—eyes wild, sword drawn, teeth bared in a grin that belonged to war and weddings alike. The wind caught his hair. It moved like flame and memory.
Seungho gasped.
The images were gone.
Just Haneul again. Circling the rink, slower now, breath visible in the cold air. One glove off. Fingers curled. A small smile playing on his lips like a secret. Like he’d won something. Or stolen it.
Seungho’s fingers curled around the railing.
His chest ached.
Not from the cold.
Not from the strain.
From something older. Something buried.
Something recognizing its own shape in another body.
He was built for fire, for structure, for the comfort of patterns and things that obeyed. And yet this boy—this impossible boy—existed like light before creation. Reckless. Untouchable. Blinding.
And just like that—his eyes stung.
He reached up instinctively.
Hischeek was wet.
Tears?
No.
He didn’t cry.
Not ever.
But here he was, wiping at his face like a man who didn’t recognize his own skin.
The music began to fade. The vocals murmured a final, fractured echo—something like “I was the dark…”—before cutting out entirely.
On the other side of the glass, Haneul stopped and rose slowly. Grabbed a thermos. Took a swig, eyes narrowed, cheeks flushed. Then, slowly, he glanced up.
Their eyes met.
Time didn’t stop. It just—tightened.
The rink noise faded. The music warped in his ears. Nothing moved except that gaze.
And in that moment, Seungho felt it like a flare under his ribs:
Not recognition.
Not memory.
