Title: That Inevitable Day
Fandom: 镇魂 | Guardian (TV)
Pairing: Shen Wei/Zhao Yunlan
Rating: PG-13
Length: 449 words
Content notes: Angst, Time Loops, Episode Related, Episode 24
A/N: For the Circle challenge. Many thanks to china_shop for betaing!

Summary: You'll know the truth one day, Shen Wei promises, and it's not a lie.

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Shen Wei:
我瞒你的事情总有一天会让你知道的。
The things I kept from you ... you'll definitely know them one day.

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You'll know the truth one day, Shen Wei promises, and it's not a lie. Or only half of one: after all, what he means is not exactly what Zhao Yunlan thinks he's saying.

He's not promising to tell. Shen Wei won't tell - he can't now, and won't need to then. Time flows in a circle, and inevitably, one day Zhao Yunlan will know.

Time will loop around, turning past into present, Zhao Yunlan into Kunlun, and in that moment, long ago, Zhao Yunlan will understand. He will know what Shen Wei kept from him and why, and he will keep the same secret from a young Shen Wei in turn.

But what will come after? Shen Wei tries not to think about it, and fails every time.

He saw Kunlun disappear into a wormhole, but where did it take him? Will it bring him back to Shen Wei? Will they be separated for good, lost to each other after all? He doesn't know.

And if the wormhole does bring him back, will Shen Wei be here for him to come back to? This, also, he can't know. There's a chance - of course there is a chance - but with the plans Shen Wei has set in motion, it's not something he cares to lay odds on.

He can't know when, or what comes first. If Shen Wei's contingency plans prove necessary, both Ye Zun and he may well be dead before Zhao Yunlan ever finds his way into the past.

And perhaps, after all, that only makes sense: perhaps that is why Zhao Yunlan was so delighted to see him then, his joy so bright Shen Wei couldn't help but be drawn to it. Perhaps it was a reunion for him, not merely a glimpse into distant history.

Whether it's death that separates them or merely a wormhole: their time is a circle spanning ten thousand years, but it may be smaller than Shen Wei once thought.

Perhaps this is all they ever were: something that was over before it began. Perhaps what shone brightly across the ten thousand years that span Shen Wei's life was never more than a moment in Zhao Yunlan's life, something that flared brightly and then vanished. Perhaps their time is a tiny circle, closing in on itself.

One day, Zhao Yunlan, you will know.

In his darkest hours, Shen Wei almost hopes the situation with Ye Zun will come to a head before that day. Even if it spells his death. After all, in that case, Zhao Yunlan will come out of it alive, unscathed and unscarred, still capable of such joy - and that alone will have been worth it.


~end~