Work Text:
The smell of mildew and dust invades Zoey’s nostrils as she wanders through the antique store. Her steps creak on the stained wooden floor as her gaze sweeps over the business’s wares.
Too new…too clean…too boring!
Zoey huffs quietly as she scans for anything that might be of interest to her. She had thought this was a brilliant idea when one of the comments on her latest video suggested it.
“ you should go to antique stores and get creepy old stuff to investigate! objects are very strong magnets for spiritual energy ^.^”
It sounded fun in theory. Zoey is always looking for new things to try on the paranormal investigation channel she runs with her girlfriend, Mira.
Mira, who definitely does not know about this shopping trip.
It isn't a secret or anything! It's just… an excursion she is taking alone and keeping to herself.
That isn't to imply Mira is unsupportive of her girlfriend's efforts to find proof of the supernatural. Quite the opposite, actually; Mira has been her biggest cheerleader from the very beginning.
Zoey is more worried that the other woman will be annoyed at the additional clutter in their apartment. The small space has already been half taken over by various filming or ghost hunting equipment.
She is already very grateful for the fact that Mira is okay with dedicating this much time and space to something the older woman doesn't even believe in.
Mira is the skeptic to Zoey’s enthusiastic believer. It's a dynamic that their viewers absolutely eat up, and it's also completely genuine. Mira wasn't even on camera initially, starting out as the editor and cameraman unit her snide behind-the-scenes comments went viral.
“I couldn't help but notice that you've been looking at the belt buckles for quite some time.”
Zoey is startled out of her thoughts by an older man with glasses smiling at her. “Did you have any questions for me?”
She recognizes the voice as the one that greeted her when she entered. A glance to the side tells her that she was, in fact, staring at belt buckles while lost in thought.
Zoey is just about to default to her polite American strategy of saying “No thanks, just looking!” and scampering off in embarrassment at having been perceived before she remembers that she actually is here looking for something specific.
“Do you have anything…haunted?” The words slip out before Zoey has a chance to make them eloquent.
The man doesn’t answer immediately, and she is slightly anxious to see an inquisitive look on his face.
Oh man. Please don’t ask what it’s for. It wouldn’t be the first time she’s had to explain her hobby-turned-career to a perfect stranger, but it always makes her feel like a little kid explaining her make-believe game to adults.
Luckily, instead of asking any further questions, the man simply motions for her to follow and walks away towards the back of the store.
Vaguely, alarm bells sound in her head at being led to the back of an unfamiliar store by a strange man. Zoey promptly mutes them in the name of content creation.
She is led to a small register area tucked away against the back wall. There's a door labeled “Employees Only” behind the counter, which is made of several glass display cases housing various oddities.
When the man slips behind the counter and goes through the door, Zoey hesitates. Her internal etiquette war is ended when he pops his head out and gestures for her to keep following.
The room beyond the “Employees Only” sign is cluttered and dimly lit. Zoey can barely see where she is stepping as she trails behind the stranger that she is slowly growing suspicious of. She’s just about decided that it's time to turn tail and rethink her life choices when the man stops at one of many full storage shelves.
“Ah-ha, here we are. I can't carry it myself, you see-arthritis in my hips-but it’s a fantastic bargain!” He is gesturing to what appears to be a large black duffel bag on the bottom shelf, and Zoey leans in for a closer look.
The duffel bag is covered with shoddily-patched tears and ominous stains. Zoey’s latent survival instincts are suddenly in full swing as she stares at the bag.
There’s a dead body in there. There is 100%, guaranteed, without a doubt a dead body in there.
She almost yelps when the store’s proprietor leans down and yanks out the bag onto the floor and into full view. He starts to pull down the zipper, and Zoey genuinely contemplates turning around and running before she sees the contents.
Oh. Not a dead body. Just a lot of…trash.
It’s like someone went to an estate sale, made a B-line for the garage, and shoved everything into a bag. She can see an old-timey clock next to a clear storage container filled with what appears to be a bunch of disassembled watches. A pair of once-freshly-polished loafers are tucked away underneath a typewriter shell that is missing several keys.
What catches Zoey’s eye, however, is the top half of a guitar she can see peeking out from beneath some other objects. It appears to be a simple, old-fashioned acoustic guitar made out of carefully hewn ash wood. In contrast to the other things in the bag, the instrument (or what Zoey can see of it) appears to be in one piece.
Then there are the patterns. Jagged dark purple lines branch out across the wood like a Lichtenberg figure. It's beautiful in a way that makes her catch her breath and reach out to trace the instrument before realizing what she's doing.
Embarrassed, Zoey snatches back her hand and looks up at the man who just stares back at her with that ominous all-seeing gaze. “So, uh, how much?”
“400,000 won.”
She has to make an active effort to keep her jaw from dropping. Sure, there’s a lot of potential in these items- Zoey can feel herself getting excited at the prospect of testing them for supernatural connections- but she hadn’t exactly been expecting to spend that much money on this trip.
Zoey opens her mouth to say no. She’s going to be responsible, and say, “Thank you, but I think I will actually go home now.” She will go back to her apartment and kiss her girlfriend and forget all about this ill-advised trip that sprouted from a Youtube comment , of all things.
But…she doesn’t say no. She doesn’t say anything at all. Her mouth dumbly hangs open for a moment before she snaps it shut again and her gaze darts back to the guitar laying there under other antiques, shoved in a bag and left to rot.
The credit card Mira gave her “just in case” is burning a hole in Zoey’s pocket. It wouldn’t be the first mildly irresponsible purchase she’s made with it, or even the most expensive.
(After all, when Mira had given it to her, she had a look of mischief in her eyes.
“Take this. It’s under my parents’ name. I want you to have it for emergencies,” Mira’s grin was crooked as she slipped the card into Zoey’s turtle wallet. “Or, you know, whatever.”)
And that's how Zoey ends up lugging home at least 30 pounds of miscellaneous haunted objects via public transportation.
By the time she gets back to their apartment, Zoey almost has a plan for what to tell her girlfriend. It should be as simple as tucking the duffel bag away in their spare-bedroom-turned studio and giving Mira a short PowerPoint presentation on why this is actually super cool and a great opportunity.
(...maybe some puppy dog eyes, too, if the situation calls for it.)
Zoey sighs with relief when her front door comes into view. She shoves her key into the lock and pushes the door open.
The bag’s weight on her shoulder had started aching ages ago, but she had been too determined to pay it any attention. Now, it's as if the proximity to her couch has made her body decide that it's done with the impromptu weight training.
Her shoulder buckles under the bag’s straps, and she watches in slow motion as it detaches from her arm and falls unceremoniously onto the small shoe rack set up next to the entryway.
Their poor, cheap, department store shoe rack doesn't stand a chance under the meteor of junk Zoey dragged halfway across Seoul.
The whole thing resolves with a CRASH! as Zoey thanks the universe that Mira isn't home right now.
“Zo? Are you okay?
Well, shit.
Zoey looks up from the wreckage of the shoe rack to see her girlfriend staring in concern from the hallway entrance.
Mira’s eyes widen as she takes in more of the scene. “...why is there a small body bag on top of our shoe rack?”
Zoey grins sheepishly. “Hello, my beautiful, talented, intelligent girlfriend. What are you doing home from work so early?”
Even though their channel has started to take off to the point where they no longer need real jobs, Mira still works part-time at a local dance studio as an instructor. She claims it's for practicality’s sake; a fallback in case their chosen career doesn't work out. Zoey knows that it's more than that, but she doesn't want to make Mira insecure by pointing it out.
“Early?” Mira muses, walking over to where Zoey still stands in the entryway. “It's 6pm, babe. You were gone for hours.”
Whoops. The day must have gotten away from her while she was busy dragging home this stupid duffel bag.
“Oh. Well, how was work?” Zoey closes the distance between them by sliding her hands over the other woman's hips and tilting her head up for a kiss.
Instead of soft lips, a finger is placed on Zoey's lips, and her eyes open to see Mira with a brow raised and definitely trying to keep amusement from showing on her face.
“The body bag, babe?”
“There’s no way I’m getting out of this without explaining that right now, is there?” Zoey shuffles closer and rests her head against Mira’s chest.
“Not at all. If there is a body in it, though, just call me next time. You don’t have to bring it into our apartment.” Mira brings her up to wrap around Zoey, who sighs.
“It isn’t a body! Although, if we’re lucky, there’s technically dead people in there…”
Mira pulls back, gently prying Zoey off of herself. The pink-haired woman just looks at her girlfriend with a knowing quirk of her lips.
“You bought stuff to investigate for the channel.”
“Okay, so, it’s like- wait, what? How did you know? Scratch that, of course you know.”
Zoey continues to grumble about her partner’s eerie perception skills while she hauls the bag over to the floor in front of their couch. Mira doesn’t look disapproving, exactly, which she will take as a good sign.
Zoey leans down and tugs open the zipper, unveiling her haul with a dramatic hand flourish as she awaits judgement.
Mira just stares into the bag for a moment.
“Zoey, how much of your money did you spend on allegedly haunted trash?”
“None, I swear!”
“...how much of my money did you spend on allegedly haunted trash?”
The shorter woman grins. “Well, technically, it was your parents money…”
This gets a chuckle from Mira, at least. “Can’t argue with that. Bigger problem; what are we going to do with this stuff when we’re done with the video?”
“You’re forgetting the potential for discovery, Mi! What if one of these contains the proof we need to show the world that ghosts are real?” She peers up at her girlfriend with her biggest, wateriest puppydog eyes.
Mira pinches the bridge of her nose between two fingers but smiles in a way that lets Zoey know she isn't actually upset. “Okay, babe. Let’s see what junk you got for us.”
They end up pulling out the contents and scattering it around their floor to be sorted later. Mira’s eyes widen as she finally pulls out the guitar.
“Okay, wait. This is sick.” She turns it over in her arms as Zoey grins triumphantly at her. “Not sure if it exactly screams ‘haunted’, though. A little dusty, sure, but…” Mira trails off, apparently squinting at something around the base of the instrument’s neck.
Zoey leans in closer. “Whatcha see?”
Mira squints at it for a few seconds before giving up. “I don't have my glasses on, but it looks like it's engraved with something.” She hands the guitar over to Zoey, who investigates the neck of the guitar herself.
Sure enough, engraved into the ash is a name.
“Ryu Rumi,” she says aloud. Something in the air shifts with the two words. It's subtle, but unmistakable, and the hairs along Zoey's arms raise.
Mira seems oblivious to it, though. “Rumi, huh? Never heard of that brand, so it must be a custom inscription. Pretty cool.” She makes a grabby motion for the instrument and Zoey hands it over obediently.
“Let's see how out of tune this thing is after not being played for who knows how long.” Mira's fingers glide over the strings before beginning to pluck them in a simple melody.
She only makes it a few chords in before her hands pause in surprise. It takes Zoey a moment to catch up to the problem, but she understands when Mira slowly resumes playing.
The guitar isn't out of tune. At all. Zoey may not be as adept of a player as Mira when it comes to string instruments, but she knows enough to hear that it's perfectly in tune.
The younger woman sits there entranced as her girlfriend plays a tune for her. Her grin widens when she recognizes it as one of Mira’s original compositions.
Zoey lets the melody wash over her as she admires Mira. Her long pink hair and sharp features, her relaxed posture as she plays the music, the way the air around her sparkles with tiny beams of light.
Wait, what?
Zoey squints. Sure enough, literal flashes of light flicker in the air around Mira. The other woman hasn't seemed to notice, staring forward as if in a trance.
Suddenly, the entire room is awash in rays of color that only grow more intense with each passing note. Purple mist begins to fizzle off of the guitar, leaking out from the jagged patterns like they are cracks in an air chamber. Zoey gasps, alarmed, but Mira just keeps playing.
The mist curls and condenses between them, forming into a humanoid shape that has Zoey scrambling backwards until her back hits their couch.
The song tapers off as quickly as it began, and she's left staring up at the figure that formed out of the mist.
It's more of a silhouette than an actual person. Zoey can only make out so many details; what appears to be long hair piled into a braid, golden eyes, and glowing pink patterns that bear a striking similarity to that of the guitar weaving all over it.
Zoey doesn't scream. She is very proud of the fact that she doesn't scream. Instead, she leaps across the room while giving the creature a large circumference, flinging herself in front of Mira as the latter finally begins to snap out of whatever spell she had been under.
“Mira, run! I'll hold off the ghost!” She puts her fists up in a defensive posture. “Don't come near my girlfriend, Ghostie! I have a black belt in jiu jitsu and I am not afraid to use it.”
Zoey only registers the beating of her own heart in the silence that follows.
The spectre tilts its head at her in a motion so disarmingly adorable that she almost drops her guard completely.
“I am not a ghost,” It says, and it- her voice
is beautiful in a way Zoey is almost less prepared for than she was for whatever the hell is happening in her living room.
“What the fuck?” Is the first thing out of Mira's mouth since the song started. Zoey turns her head to look at her, and her girlfriend is impressively composed for how much she can see the skeptic’s worldview turning over in her head.
The not-ghost’s eyes slide over so today her gaze is unmistakably fixed on Mira before she proceeds to lean forward and bow.
“Hello, Master,” she says, voice smooth like silk with the way it glides over the other women's skin. “How may I be of service?”
Zoey's gaze whips between her girlfriend and the misty figure. She puts her arms up in a T shape.
“Okay, timeout! Let's pause there, everybody. Who are you and why are you calling my girlfriend “Master”? She prefers “Mistress”, first of all, and second of all, back off!” She points her finger at the not-ghost in a manner that she really hopes is threatening.
The misty spectre shifts her arms in a way that Zoey registers as a placating gesture as the golden eyes widen.
“Did-did no one explain it to you?” The creature’s voice waivers in a way that is so painfully human it gives Zoey pause.
Luckily, Mira answers for her. “Sorry, dude. We found you in a bag of old junk that my girlfriend bought. No instructions included.”
“Oh.” The creature blinks, but recovers quickly.“My name is Rumi, and you summoned me by playing a song with my vessel. As the contract states, I owe you three wishes. You may request fulfillment of a wish by speaking aloud a statement preceded by ‘I wish’.”
Rumi recites all of this in a way that gives Zoey the impression that it's a well rehearsed speech. She can't help but think that that's kind of adorable.
Mira holds up a hand. “Okay, wait. So you're, what, a genie?”
Rumi expresses as much surprise as a nondescript face made of mist can. “A Djinn, but yes. So you are familiar.”
“Only from the fucking movies!” Zoey hears the moment Mira's composure begins to slip as the reality of the situation sets in, so she decides to interject.
“Thank you so much for the offer, but we are actually super good.”
Rumi’s eyes slide over to focus on Zoey for the first time, and it's honestly a little intimidating. The black-haired girl inches closer to her girlfriend for comfort.
“I only serve her .” The spectral woman points right at Mira.
Zoey frowns. “That doesn't seem fair. We're basically married, so by California law it's a 50/50 split of all possessions.”
“What is ‘California’?”
“We’re in South Korea?”
Zoey ignores the simultaneous exclamations and continues. “So, you know, I think I deserve the rank of Master too. Wait, that's besides the point. No wishes needed! I know how genies work. You'll twist our words and give us hotdogs for fingers. Or something.”
Mira puts a hand on her shoulder and glares at Rumi. “She's right. Not about the finger hot dogs. We're a package deal, so, if I'm in charge, so is Zoey.”
Rumi only hesitates for a moment before nodding. “Understood, Mistress. The problem is…both my vessel and I are bound to you until my duty is complete. I am not a mischievous spirit like some of my kin. I desire only to serve.”
Something about the way her melodic voice says the last part leaves Zoey a little flushed.
“Do we have to use the wishes right now?” Mira asks.
“No, but-”
“Fantastic, then I think we'd like a moment alone to talk about this development. If you wouldn't mind?”
The purple shadow takes a step back, and Zoey wishes she could make out a clear expression on Rumi’s face.
“As you wish.” Rumi bows again, and her hazy figure dissolves into a cloud of lilac that seeps back into the patterns of the guitar.
A long moment goes by where Mira and Zoey stare at the space that just contained a fucking genie , and then at each other as they try to come to terms with this information.
Zoey speaks first, if only to freak out. “Oh my gosh. Oh my gosh, Mira! That was real actual proof of the supernatural! I can't believe we weren't filming. What are we going to tell the viewers?”
Mira brings her hands up, putting them on either side of the shorter woman's face. “Breath, baby. I don't think we should run to social media just yet. This is…kind of insane. And even if people believe us, that's a huge level of scrutiny to go under unprepared.”
Zoey allows herself a moment of grounding by staring into Mira’s eyes. She lets out a breath. “You're right. As always. I'm just hungry and tired from dragging all that stuff across the city.”
She lets herself be pulled into Mira’s arms, tucking her head into her favorite spot on her girlfriend's neck.
“I'll start the electric kettle and we can whip up some instant ramyeon. Then we can…unpack things.” Mira says it quietly into the air above Zoey's head, who nods into the warmth of her lover’s skin.
They don't talk about it while Mira heats up the water. They don't talk about it during the ramyeon’s 3 minute cook time, or while they silently devour the noodles at their small dining table.
It's only as they are getting ready for bed that the topic is broached, with Mira in the bathroom brushing her teeth and Zoey getting ready to spring a question on her while she has a mouth full of toothpaste.
“What are you gonna wish for?” Zoey goes for a casual approach, grabbing a nail file off the counter and idly brushing it against her nails while she waits for a response.
She hears Mira laugh around the toothbrush, and after a moment there's the sound of toothpaste being spat out and rinsed down the sink.
“I'm not, Zo. I totally get that you're excited for the proof, but we can't forget that this is a completely unknown entity that we are dealing with.” She smirks a little, and adds, “Cute voice, though. I wish she had a body to go with it.”
The words have barely left Mira’s mouth before the air ripples around them. The bathroom is instantly filled with an intensifying purple light originating from the open door to the bedroom, where the guitar sits propped against a corner.
“Did you just say-”
“Oh fuck.”
The light reaches a peak that forces both women to close their eyes. When Zoey pries hers open and finally blinks all the spots out of her vision, she checks the bedroom first.
Sure enough, lying in the middle of their bed, is a woman.
A fully corporeal naked woman.
Her long purple hair is, in fact, piled in a braid top of her head. It appears soft and shiny where it rests against her pale skin. The patterns are still present, spreading across her body from head to toe. They are a calm, iridescent blue instead of the harsh pinks and purples they had flashed in her mist form. Her face is breathtakingly beautiful, marred only by the panic flashing across it.
Rumi speaks first, her lovely voice clearer and more present than it had been earlier. “Uh, okay. That's new.”
Zoey is staring and she knows it. Before she can collect her jaw from off the floor, Mira gently pushes past her into the bedroom.
The pink-haired woman grabs a blanket from the foot of their bed and practically flings it over Rumi.
“Why did you grant that wish?” She hisses, and Zoey notes the way her face is flushed.
Rumi makes a noise of distress from under the blanket. “I don't have a choice!”
Her hands appear from under the edge of the throw as the genie pulls it off of her head before wrapping it around herself modestly.
“I don't have a choice,” Rumi repeats, quieter this time. “It's part of the contract.”
Despite not knowing what the hell she's talking about, Zoey feels bad for the poor woman. She sees Mira about to double down, and rushes to cut her off.
“That's okay, Rumi. We're sorry to have summoned you a little too early- you can go back to the guitar now.” Zoey smiles kindly.
But Rumi doesn't move. Her eyes- brown, Zoey notes, instead of that piercing gold- flicker between the two women with uncertainty.
“I…don't think I can.” She looks down at her blanket-wrapped body as if seeing it for the first time. “I think I'm stuck.”
Zoey and Mira meet each other's eyes, a million silent questions dancing between them.
The most prominent thought was clear, though.
Oh, fuck .