Angels Are Rebelling
"Not how you expected it to be, huh?" Arthur whispered, nearly drowned out by the gurgling bubbling sound of water rushing in and replacing air. Arthur gave him a wry smirk, his eyes ancient and impossibly young at once.
"I thought we would go down in a hail of fire and brimstone. Preferably on the battle field. Not water." Francis snorted, looking at the water that lapped at his toes in disgust, curling in on himself farther as though it would stop the water from climbing. "I always hated the ocean."
Arthur laughed, a warped sound that wasn't quite fitting for the situation. Too cheerful. Then again, Arthur had always found so much joy in his gloom. "The ocean's a temptress, temperamental and dangerous. In fact..." he paused, head falling onto Francis's shoulder, body shaking with silent laughter. "The ocean always reminded me of you."
Francis laughed as well, stretching out his legs when he couldn't be bothered to resist the water or it's gruesome touch any longer. "I guess that's why I hate it so much. Like things repel, after all."
"Don't bring your physics crap into this. I don't want to die confused."
At some point their fingers had tangled. At some point, they had gravitated towards each other both in fear and comfort, laughing bitterly and joyously at once, cradling each other because they had nothing else, and because they had always known it would end with each other.
"Fire and brimstone, huh? How did that go?" Arthur asked, wrapping himself in Francis's arms against the unbearable cold. He was soaking wet from trying to find drainage pipes to prolong the inevitability. They had things to say to each other, and they wouldn't die, they refused to, until they said it.
"For so long, we went through battle after battle. And we would fight with swords, even when they invented better guns, for the purpose of intimacy, I think. And the cannons would be roaring around us. And men would be screaming, and it was hell." Francis laughed dryly, gorgeous blue eyes more powerful than any of the storms the ocean had ever produced, more consuming than the water that lapped at their feet now.
Arthur couldn't resist then. Didn't want to. He figured that, right now, if he could just say this one thing, if he could kiss him with the last breath in his body and hold onto Francis while the world ended, the world could go right ahead and end. He didn't care. He didn't care. He had never cared. So he kissed him, loved the way Francis tensed because none of their kisses were ever gentle, and Francis didn't know how to handle raw affection.
"What else?" he whispered against his mouth, satisfied, even as the water engulfed them up to their knees.
"I thought 'if I die right now, if I wrap my fingers around his throat and squeeze, and he stabs me, if I die right now. So long as I take him with me...' I thought, surely that was how we would die. What was more fitting for us? Dying with the screams our men in our ears in a world much like the one we would be heading to, in each other's arms." Francis made it sound so bloody poetic, Arthur laughed.
Beneath them, the house groaned in protest as the water seeped in, surging and relentless. From the tiny attic window, Arthur could make out the ocean liners and cruise ships that had been used as rescue boats, glittering lights in the murky half darkness. "We could have made it, you know." Francis hummed, hugging him harder, and they ignored the pit of cold fear in their stomachs, tried not to stare at it too long because hadn't a great man once said it would stare back?
"What are you thinking of?" Francis asked gently to fill the silence, face buried in Arthur's shaggy blonde hair and committing his spicy sweet scent of heather and peppermint to memory, for however long he would have it.
"That if I knew all those years ago that I was going to commit suicide anyway, I would have put a gun in my mouth." Arthur's grin was just as wry. Ancient and young. "What about you?"
"I wonder...if the angels are rebelling. If perhaps this end of the world business is just god having a temper tantrum." They laughed together, curling closer as the water swallowed their waists, cold and warm and sad and happy all at once, unsure what to do in the face of a calamity so large that they, immortals, were just specks of dust against it.
"Your god is insane. What, did Michael forget to bring him his morning coffee just the way he liked it?" They collapsed in more laughter, lapsing into silence, staring at nothing and everything and each other. They kissed. Just as gentle as the one Arthur had given Francis. Francis still stiffened at the raw affection, as though confused, and Arthur continued to find it adorable.
"I wonder if we'll live, despite the water, and we'll keep on living till this planet turns to dust." Arthur had no answer to that, feeling himself start to float on the water as it climbed up to his chest.
He took Francis's hand, clenched it tight, looked into his eyes and saw fear and bravery, a tempest, a tiger and angel and a demon and a war god, a child and an old man, and he knew that Francis saw the same in him. "Do you trust me?" Francis smiled, brilliant in the half darkness, water making the ends of his hair stick to his neck, and he looked so heartbreakingly beautiful. "Tell me you trust me."
"I trust you."
They swam to the window, knocking it open, and crawled out onto the roof where, just below, the world was engulfed in water, an ocean as far as the edges of the earth, ceaseless and infinite and terrifying. "Hold me tight, Frog. Don't let go for anything."
They didn't jump, not quite, standing in the pounding rain, holding tight while the inside of the house continued to flood, the water spilling out the window at their feet. "Where do you think we'll go, if we die?" Francis stared at the sky, blinking when the water landed in his eyes until it almost looked like he was crying.
"Do we even have souls?"
Francis snorted. "We have souls. We have to. We're not like the mermaids, we won't turn to foam."
Arthur smiled, kissing the tip of Francis's noses and wrapping his arms around his waist while Francis hugged his shoulders, holding so tight Arthur was sure they both would shatter. "Then let's hope we go somewhere with better weather."
It was a short dive into the water, and it swallowed them like a great mouth, plunging them into darkness. They could barely see their breaths floating past their own faces in soothing bubbles. And there was blank terror, eyes slipping shut as they held each other, a constant I don't want to die, I don't want to die.
But so long as I take him with me.