Galaxy 24

He was standing before her, the outline of his body slightly blurred as though she were seeing him through a heat wave, but his eyes, they still cut into her flawlessly. Silver, glassy orbs that were fastened steadfastly on her own stricken face, sensing perhaps, the very throb and beat of her heart.

She shook her head, looked away. This was too dangerous right now. How could she-

When she raised her head again, he was a stone’s throw away from her, listening, expectant.

She closed her eyes for a moment then, knowing he would be closer still when she opened them again, and then she was picking out the stars trembling beneath his skin, the galaxies forming and collapsing in swirls of vibrant color on his forearms, the suns dying and being reborn again at her fingertips. She glimpsed his hand for only a fleeting moment, yet she knew that she had seen at least a millennium fly past in that moment, from birth to death.

Finally, she lifted her gaze to those opaque eyes, staring so blankly at her only because they could see a world beyond her. Or perhaps he was seeing her, but a version of her that thrived far in the past or in the future, her soul distorted into shapes worlds apart from how she appeared before him now.

Wordlessly, she reached out, dusting a few constellations from his skin as she took his hand in hers, and watched as the stars bled over into her skin as well, transforming her hand into a temporary map of deep space. His fingers burned where they striped against her flesh, lines of pale fire branding into her bare skin.

“Where am I supposed to go now?” she asked him, her tone lilting up almost defiantly. He turned his head fractionally to the right, his eyes shifting in their sockets as they located what he was searching for.

With a decisive nod, he turned back to her, his eyes coming as close to focusing on her as they ever had. She listened, her fingers coming loose from his to trace up his arm to the galaxy he put forth.

“Without you?”

He was silent before her, an answer in itself.

With a soft smile, she took his hand once more and raised it to her mouth briefly, feeling the star fire burn for a moment at her lips before she softly brushed them across his skin until her entire cheek rested against the back of his hand.

Immediately, she felt the universes swirling within his body began to seep into her own pale skin, inky tendrils snaking across her face like bursts of watercolor. Stars washed into the depths of her eyes as if sucked in by twin black holes, and when she drew in a shuddering breath, she felt supernovae expand within her lungs.

When she felt the very edges of her being beginning to blur away, shivering into and out of existence, she channeled all of her energy into pulling away from him because if she didn’t do it now then-

When she opened her eyes, it was night. Three moons hung in the sky above her, two as pale as she remembered and one as red as blood.