My student council leader is a demon!

by TheOhDeerArchives

Summary:

This love story starts like any other - two rivals with a common enemy who happens to be insufferably perfect and maybe not so bad after all.

Notes:

• Inspired by The beginnings of something favourable by TheOhDeerArchives

Not sure what the update rhythm will look like but I'm hoping to get this completed by this Sunday! (Don't hold your breath though.)

Chapter 1: Prologue: An eternal solar eclipse

Summary:

Fifteen years ago, Mi-Yeong of the Sunlight Sisters died. And no matter how present they seemed, Celine and Min Ju did too.

Four white walls, one white ceiling, one wooden door and one wooden floor.

A few cupboards, one desk and two framed photographs.

The office was like a meticulously clean lair. Silence haunted this lair, or rather the owner of it and wherever she chose to dwell, in the same way ghosts haunt graveyards – quiet as death but never really gone.

Most people didn’t know what to do with this silence, they tried to occupy it with laughs that were too loud and smiles that were too wide. These women didn’t do that, didn’t try to fill the absence. Instead, they let it empty them.

Fifteen years ago, Mi-Yeong of the Sunlight Sisters died. And no matter how present they seemed, Celine and Min Ju did too.

(An eternal solar eclipse – the constant absence of sunlight.)

───  ⋅ ∙ ∘ ☽ ༓ ☾ ∘ ⋅ ⋅  ───

All the best parts of themselves died with their leader and they were left with the broken pieces of each other. A sisterly relationship was stripped bare by grief and beaten by burden. Despite loving Mi-Yeong in very different ways from each other, they felt the loss in painful similarity.

Celine announced the disbanding to the public, she felt it was her duty as the eldest – nobody reminded her that she used to be the second oldest, she already knew it too well. The ‘used to, was, did, not now, not anymore, gone’ of it all haunted every waking and sleeping moment.

Min Ju, the maknae, tried her best to stretch over the holes with her brightness but it wasn’t long before she fell into one and didn’t come back up. After balancing on her last straw for so long, it had been yanked from beneath her by a creature who was just too innocent for the sin it was.

A baby.

(Of some sorts.)

The flesh and blood of Mi-Yeong.

(But did it have either of those things?)

Soft, fragile skin and small, useless limbs. A mouth only capable of feeding or wailing to be fed. Eyes opening occasionally to slip out liquid vulnerability and violet strands of hair which were too soft for the devilishness that caused them.

(How cruelly ironic it was that this little monster was the only remnants of the greatest woman who ever lived.)

Demons have no need for a mother, you see, they don’t deserve one. Therefore, any women who have the misfortune to birth such a beast are doomed from the second they conceive. Life has no mercy for the beauty of your soul or the goodness of your heart when you carry corruption, suffering and upmost evilness in your womb.

(Tainting the world with young malice is a crime punishable by a slow, painful demise.)

So, Mi-Yeong broke down into a mess so unfair for the masterpiece that she was.

Veins poisoned a deep purple beneath greying skin, breathing becoming a battle that she was sorely losing, the huntress passed like the threat of a storm – dark, sorrowful and oh so heavy.

Unsurprising to no one and bittersweet to everyone, love had been the last thing to succumb to the finality of her condition.

(But love can only beat a failing heart for so long.)

Cradled in the lap of her betrayed beloved and hands held by the closest thing she had to a little sister, Mi-Yeong croaked her last words with the softness and beauty that she used to sing in.

“Make sure my girl is loved.”

Her body stilled with the beginnings of a smile that could never be finished, and her eyes were closed by hands that quivered with the loss of grip.

“I promise.” Celine had vowed with a hoarse voice and resolve to protect whatever was left of her one and only now gone and forever.

“That thing is not a girl.” Min Ju had hissed with sweetness soured into something bitter and unwell.

(Bolted to the floor by emotion, the new eldest was powerless to stop the maknae turned malicious.)

Min Ju approached the neglected crib that had hosted the reason for all this sorrow for the lonely few months of its life. Correction – existence, not life. Life was too pretty a word for the ugly that it was. Summoned from the grieving Honmoon, iridescent blades hovered above the infant’s head as the wielder shook with tortured fury.

“You can’t kill a baby,” pleaded the goodness left in her.

“It killed her,” spat back the poorly directed fury.

“I won’t let you break my promise,” roared the only person who acted out of love and duty, not mercy.

Mi-Yeong’s ruined body lay on the mat life left it on. Unnamed and unloved and so terribly lonely, the creature wailed in its crib for something other than food but something that didn’t come. Unanswered cries soundtracked the battle erupting in the hanok.

Weapons clashed, blades cut, wounds bled, words shouted, promises kept.

(The aftermath: a scar on Min Ju’s left eye, a permanent limp to Celine’s right leg and a baby named Rumi.)

───  ⋅ ∙ ∘ ☽ ༓ ☾ ∘ ⋅ ⋅  ───

“My apologies for the scar.” Celine spoke without breaking the silence – you can’t break what’s already broken.

“My apologies for yours.” Min Ju responded without an ounce of remorse, eyeing the framed photograph of a young girl with purple hair and hidden sins.

(Are they sorry? Or do they just know who should be here and mutually crumble in her absence?)

Protectiveness swirled in Celine’s gut and rose her walls like a fortress. Even though she had sworn to protect whatever was left of Mi-Yeong and that only happened to include Rumi, it was impossible not to feel some level of personal fondness despite her questionable quality of parenting.

(There was no quality or parenting, only mentorship with the ghost of motherliness.)

(Celine loved Rumi as much as she could love anyone which wasn’t nearly enough.)

Elbows digging into furnished oak and fingers interlaced with a grip that whitened knuckles, Celine leaned forward and spoke with cold fury and scorching defensiveness.

“If this is about Rumi, we’ve discussed this before. She grew out of her patterns and shows no signs of being a demon, therefore she is none of your business.”

(Celine lied through her teeth. Patterns still clung to Rumi and every aspect of her life. One of the many shameful secrets.)

Lips tucked in and holding back the bitterness laced in her throat when she remembered that Guardians Incorporated – the secret organization that protects the world with everything from Hogwarts to the Marvels to the Hunters – had declared that Mi-Yeong’s demonic offspring was human enough to live freely.

(Neither Min Ju nor Guardians Incorporated knew that Celine made a deal with the demon king himself to assure that Rumi’s hidden identity was untraceable.)

(Except for his branding littered across her skin.)

“As much as I doubt the thing under your care is truly one of us and not one of them.” Min Ju starts scathingly, not stopping when Celine gives her a look that could kill. “I am here to discuss a different matter.”

Half an inch and no less, Celine’s shoulders dropped. She didn’t relax – never did she allow herself that luxury. But the burning urge to give Min Ju’s right eye a matching scar faded when she heard that her custody over Rumi wasn’t being threatened.

Prioritizing privacy and the maintenance of her promise, Celine resigned from GI shortly after the public side of things were handled and usually ignored all its affairs, so it was jarring when Min Ju demanded a meeting. All too aware of the hateful shell that her former bandmate had become, she braced to fight another battle to keep her secrets safe.

It was admittedly a relief that it appeared fighting was currently unnecessary.

As soon as she scarred Min Ju, Celine’s connection with the Honmoon had been severed and she couldn’t summon her weapon.

She couldn’t even see demons anymore.

(Except for a particular adolescent in her care.)

She knew they were still out there. She saw masses of missing people with unexplained disappearances and knew that Gwi-Ma would rise again. But she just couldn’t see it anymore. Even the shimmer of the mystical layer over their world hid from her sight.

She tried not to dwell on how much she grieved it.

The golden Honmoon wasn’t her burden to bear anymore.

(So why was she still so terribly burdened?)

That duty was bestowed to the junior hunters being trained by GI – an organization built off child soldiers. Celine’s duty was protecting Rumi and looking back on the fleeting moments where life was domestic and easy, maybe that duty wasn’t too bad.

But in the suffocating moment of now, the new duty weighed on her like an anvil.

One slip up, one mistake made, one pattern revealed, and it would all be ripped away from here. She would lose Mi-Yeong all over again. And deep down, buried beneath her promise and heartache, she also genuinely couldn’t bare to lose Rumi. Intelligent, kind, unfortunate, beautiful Rumi.

In another life, Celine would’ve quite liked Rumi for a daughter and Mi-Yeong for a wife, but the latter was impossible which made the former unbearable.

“So,” she kept her words careful and gave nothing away other than what she specifically gave. “What are is that different matter and why does it involve me?”

“For the last few years, GI has picked up on irregular demon behaviour. A presence hovering between the demon realm and our world, it’s morphing the Honmoon into something we don’t understand.”

Min Ju’s face contorted with frustration for a moment as she admitted her lack of knowledge reluctantly before covering it with cool triumph.

“However, we’ve recently located the most frequent activity to this area. Especially your school.”

Fortunately, the blindness in Min Ju’s left eye didn’t allow her to see the fleeting horror fracture Celine’s indifference before she mended the falter with practiced ease.

(Her faults and fears must never be seen.)

“We want to investigate and identify the anomaly.” Min Ju explained before sharpening her tone into something low and threatening. “Then terminate it.”

A beat passed. Then two.

The weight of that word hung between them in that graveyard silence. They both knew why it hit so hard. At the trial so many years ago, Min Ju had been hellbent on killing Mi-Yeong’s demon offspring – refusing to call her by her name – while Celine insisted that the Honmoon had cleansed Rumi of her demonic ancestry.

The council decided that Rumi was just an infant with unfortunate parentage that didn’t affect her own species but after that decision was announced, Min Ju had vowed to terminate the demon even if it was over Celine’s dead body. Celine slept with one eye open ever since.

That memory flooded Celine’s thoughts and threatened to drown her before she pulled her focus out of the wreckage and shook her head.

“I assure you that there is no demon activity at my school, I would know.”

This time, no beats passed. Min Ju didn’t hesitate.

“Like you knew about him?”

That was a low blow, a real fucking low blow.

Both women knew and loathed who ‘him’ was. The bastard demon who seduced Mi-Yeong before they could spot the signs. Before Celine could.

Brushing over the way her heart ached at the accusation and blame prickling in Min Ju’s tone, Celine sighed flatly and pinched the bridge of her nose.

“Well, I wouldn’t allow a full squad onto my campus.” She rejected firmly despite the weak quiver of supressed tears coiling around her retired vocal cords. “You’d disrupt the students, and my priority is their wellbeing.”

Frustrated but not deterred, Min Ju pulled out three files from her handbag and placed them on the desk. Celine eyed them suspiciously like they were pandora’s box.

“A staff member and two junior hunters.” Min Ju explained as she tapped each file with the identity it contained. “That’s all I need.”

Reluctantly, Celine opened the first one and read its contents, skimming it over for key information.

• Lisa Jeong.
• 37 years old
• former in-battle medic
• expert of demonology
• mentor of the new generation

Then Celine glanced at the picture paperclipped to the corner of the document.

(Shoulder length black curls wrapped into a messy bun, almond eyes that contained sparkles only true kindness could cause, round cheeks creased by a smile.)

The retired hunter ignored the way it made her heart flutter, no wasn’t the time to be distracted by such reactions, so she pushed it to the back of her mind.

(She’d unpack that later, or never. Probably never.)

Nodding slowly, Celine sighed as she conceded. “Okay. I can respect that choice, but two junior hunters involved with the tracking down of an anomaly? Really?”

Smug with the small victory, Min Ju didn’t falter under the doubt. If anything, she only seemed more determined. “They’re the top of their class and have been since they joined in their pre-teens.”

For a moment, for just a fleeting second, something softened.

Almost under her breath like it was a whisper from what remained of her heart, Min Ju’s gaze softened.

“They remind me of us… of how we used to be.”

Surprise flickered in Celine’s reluctance as she glanced up from the files to meet Min Ju’s eye and she almost saw the girl she used to love like a younger sister. But then she saw the scar and remembered that that girl died long ago. Defeated and done with this conversation, she nodded.

“Fine,” she sighed quietly. “I’ll allow your investigation for now.”

The dismissal in Celine’s tone frustrated Min Ju for a moment. She didn’t complain though, she didn’t linger and demand anything more. She just nodded, subtly avoiding eye contact then headed for the door.

“Min Ju?”

Min Ju waited in the doorway, glancing over her shoulder and forcing her remaining eye to meet Celine.

For a moment, they both saw Mi-yeong in each other.

“Yes?”

“You were the closest thing I ever had to a younger sister, and I loved you so much, but I loved Mi-Yeong even more, I can’t allow you to rip away all that I had left of her. And I am so sorry for that.”

“It’s the anniversary.”

Neither of them needed to clarify what or whose anniversary it was.

(The loss that left Min Ju with a scar, Celine with a limp and a motherless baby.)

“I know.”

Min Ju left before the flames of her hatred could be swallowed by the ache of her grief.

───  ⋅ ∙ ∘ ☽ ༓ ☾ ∘ ⋅ ⋅  ───

“Mi-yeong would be ashamed of you.”

The few words whispered so cruelly from the depths of Celine’s mind dragged the breath out of her lungs as soon as the door closed behind Min Ju. Heartbreak ruined her composure and brought a haunted look to her usually unreadable eyes.

That haunting silence became deafeningly quiet, a contradiction that was painfully accurate. Celine stayed sat behind her desk with silent mortification. The internal accusation sunk in and did not resurface. It drowned her. It echoed in her brain like a chant determined to torture her relentlessly.

Then she turned.

And there she was.

Mi-yeong, her Mi-yeong.

Anyone else would be screaming in terror. They would be absolutely scared shitless by the sight of someone who had died in their arms over two decades ago standing in front of them with a pleasant smile.

But Celine wasn’t frightened.

She was sorrowful.

For the first time in years, tears flooded her gaze, and she nearly collapsed from the trembling wrecking her legs as she stood up, but she wouldn’t waste this opportunity. She staggered forwards with the desperation of a wolf caught in a trap, willing to gnaw its own limb off.

She reached.

And she grabbed.

Her hand buried into the back of the living dead woman’s head, fingers digging through her hair with resolution to never let go or at least hang on for as long as possible. Her forehead pressed against the resurrected’s, and her words came out in quivering reverence.

“You’re as beautiful as the day I lost you.”

Just as her tears fell and her free hand hovering by Mi-yeong’s cheek was about to cup it, a noise startled her.

It wasn’t a scary noise, only the ringing of the morning bell, but it was enough to break her attention.

She made the mistake of turning her head to peer out the windows, watching the waves of students flooding the campus with a flicker of purple weaving through the crowds with trained grace to reach the student council meeting room.

When she turned back, she was alone again.

Mi yeong was gone, again.

Sinking into her chair like a wilting flower, she collapsed before retrieving the small bottle hidden in her draw and swallowing a few pills – medication, for the ‘schizophrenia.’

Celine knew that it wasn’t just hallucinations. She knew what doctors didn’t. She knew that the Honmoon had tied the remaining pieces of her most beloved’s soul to her own and what she saw was the manifestation of that.

After a year of chasing ghosts, it became too haunting.

So, she took her pills and focused on Rumi, on Huntrix, on the Golden Honmoon.

But sometimes, some days, she’ll purposefully skip a dosage.

 And Mi-yeong will be there.

It was unhealthy but did that really matter when she had Mi-yeong again? It was only ever a few minutes, but she knew how many people, how much Min Ju, how much Rumi, would kill for that.

Glancing down wearily at the two framed photographs on her desk and being met with the beautiful woman that haunted her, she wiped some dust off the glass before laying it face down.

The other picture was a rare smile from little Rumi after winning some competition or other. Celine didn’t look at it because that child was identical to Mi-Yeong in all the ways that haunted her.

Then she opened the two closed files with trembling hands and an aching heart. Celine immediately understood why these girls reminded Min Ju of them.

One had sharp features and the aura of a leopard leisurely aware of its power but not too smug.

(She had once carried such confidence before the person she loved with so much certainty had been torn away from her)

The other had the presence of kindness that could be a great weakness or strength, and her features were round with youth.

(Min Ju had once carried such softness before she’d been hardened by grief and a scar.)

Beaten by poor judgment encouraged by sparking curiosity, Celine glanced at Rumi’s photograph and immediately remembered all the similarities that could only be caused by genetics.

In another world, maybe Rumi and these girls loved each other as much as she, Min Ju and Mi-Yeong used to.

Celine brushed away the thought with exhausted scorn but not before registering the names of these two torturous reflections.

Mira Kotadoski and Zoey Choi.

Notes:

feedback is always welcome just be nice ! <3

Chapter 2: "You anagrammed us!"

Summary:

'First mission! I sure do hope my pretty arch-rival doesn't show up!'

Notes:

i lowkey had too much fun coming up with the nicknames

People. Buildings. More people. More buildings.

Mundane beings and objects lined the streets in a colourful yet ever so dull blur. Like all great cities, Seoul didn’t sleep. And it didn’t shut up either. Sunlight had only woken the world mere hours ago, but the concrete jungle was already alive with buzz.

Car horns, public transport, the morning work rush.

Here, during the early hours of a day in metropolis, Earth seemed to spin faster than anywhere else here. Too fast for the likings of Mira Kotadoski.

Despite her signature ‘cool under pressure’ demeanour, she couldn’t help the mess of emotions whirring in her head as she strolled down the pavement with the faux leisure of a leopard aware of its own power.

Inside, she felt rather like the kittens on those ‘Hang in there!’ posters but she wouldn’t let anyone know that.

This morning had been so brutally disastrous that even someone as indifferent as Mira was unable to escape the flood of unease it had brought.

“Get over it, Mira,” she scolded herself beneath her breath. “Just get over it!”

Frustration prickled like barbed wire in her quiet voice as she blinked away the liquid turmoil stinging behind her narrowed eyes as they burned holes into the concrete.

But it was hard to just ‘get over it’ when she could still feel the lingering of a rough hand on her cheek.

Only briefly thinking about the events responsible for her pain made her shudder involuntarily.

Mira had been spotted sneaking out last night and drinking in a bar. Underage drinking was already incredibly frowned upon in Korea, but it was worsened by how famous the Kotadoski family was.

Videos and pictures had been recorded before she could slip away from the scene of the crime. The scandal made headlines before the sun had even rose, “UNDERAGE DAUGHTER OF THE KOTADOSKI FAMILY SPOTTED AT A BAR” and of course her father’s employees had fed it back to him like the rats they are.

The internet was swarming with rumours and accusations like a virtual plague by 6AM and the argument had exploded in competition with the Blitz until 7AM and then the slap had happened at 8AM.

All of Mira’s defensives and stinging remarks had been knocked out of her mouth with the force of the hit. She didn’t even get to close her eyes and brace herself for the impact because her brother didn’t hesitate. She swore at him and claimed that he was just like their father and Sung Ho had proved her point with a violent demonstration.

And what had their parents done? Their mother sighed, turning away disapprovingly without a word while their father had smiled. He seemed proud at his son’s reaction instead of protecting his daughter and that was when she truly understood that she wasn’t a part of this family. She had never been. Her parents had only had another child in hopes for another son that keep up with their golden boy.

Those hopes had been disappointed by her – she was a disappointment, a regret.

And all three of them made sure that she knew every day. The bruise was just a visible reminder of her how horrible they found her existence.

There was no apology from Sung Ho. No concern from her parents.

Just her own thoughts, her own suppressed feelings and her own aching face.

The look on her brother’s eyes when he had hit her hurt more than the actual injury. His glare was steaming with unfiltered, unrestrained fury. One of her earliest memories replayed in her head, contradicting the anger clenching her fists on her lap.

She had been three years old, and her brother was seven, still containing his childish innocence and not yet too badly ruined by the twisted pressures of their parents. He used to look at Mira proudly, fond enthusiasm sparkling in his gaze whenever she would babble his name or randomly slam the keys during his piano practice.

That kind boy was not her brother anymore. He had grown into someone that wasn’t him but who she already knew and hated.

The boy who used to take the brunt of their parent’s anger and shield her from any hits was now the man that hit her over a petty argument.

He had grown up into their father.

THWACK

Mira’s body moved before her brain could protest, her own traitorous hands slapping her cheeks so furiously that she wouldn’t be surprised if her skin was now as flushed as her hair. Unsurprisingly, the ache of her bruise worsened considerably but it had the desired effect.

Any troublesome thoughts about this morning’s incident, last night’s scandal or the other exceptionally shitty parts of herself were instantly pushed away and replaced with something worth thinking about.

Her first mission. Her first real mission.

Foreign and rare, the beginnings of a smile tugged at the corners of her lips as excitement ran through her veins like electricity.

When children turn 12 years old, most of them start the make-or-break experience that is middle school.

Ever the wild card, Mira was instead selected to join GI – Generational Innovation – Academy.

Nobody called out how strange it was that a supposedly prestigious education only available to the exceptional few were offering a place to a moody pre-teen that spent more time in the principal’s office than classrooms.

Mr and Mrs Kotadoski simply had to hear ‘discipline’ for them to gladly enrol Mira who had little choice in the matter.

On her first day, it was soon revealed that Generational Innovation was a total load of bullshit and only a cover for Guardians Incorporated – the secret organization that protects the world with everything from Hogwarts to the Marvels.

Mira Kotadoski simply had to hear ‘freedom’ for her to be glad that she was enrolled.

Scouted by Lisa Jeong – lead mentor of the Junior Hunters – at a dance competition that her parents of course failed to attend, Mira had been chosen by both the organization and the Honmoon to become a candidate for the next generation of Hunters. Against the obliviousness of her family and the world, she trained relentlessly until she was the top trainee.

Well, one of the top trainees.

As if a dark storm cloud had rained on her parade, Mira’s recovering mood took a turn for a worse as she recalled the fellow student who hadn’t ever allowed her to take the number one spot that she knew she deserved.

Zoey fucking Choi.

Or as Mira likes to call her – shortass, space buns for brains, the American, frogspawn, chihuahua, chihuahua with some blades and plethora of other taunts that never fail to get under the other girl’s skin.

However, it doesn’t take a detective to notice that these quips never included insults about Zoey’s appearance. And this could be for two reasons. A) Mira wasn’t the type of jackass to mock people for being ugly. She’d much rather be cunning and poke where she knows will touch a nerve. B) Zoey is simply a pretty girl.

For her own sanity, Mira pretends that the latter isn’t even a possibility.

Mira hates Zoey. Zoey hates Mira. It’s a simple fact of life.

They began the academy on the same day and clashed like tectonic plates every day after that. Vivid, bubbly and energetic didn’t get along well with the slogan of Mira’s life – ‘enemy by default.’

Yet, despite their constant rivalry… Mira can’t say she respects anyone more than Zoey. She’s the only person that offers her a challenge and seems to want this as badly as she does.

The memory of sparring with the other girl until they both collapsed from exhaustion is fresh despite the constant thunder and lightning battling in Mira’s brain. She hadn’t even been disappointed by the draw, just thrilled from the experience.

Though that thrill burns into scorn every time Zoey insists that she blacked out a fraction of a second later, therefore is victorious.

(Lisa Jeong knows that they crumpled on the same millionth of a second because she knows everything, but she’d never admit that. The rivalry has always been incredibly amusing to spectate.)

So, fine. Maybe Zoey isn’t the worst thing in Mira’s life. Maybe Mira enjoys being kept on her toes by that insufferable pipsqueak and her can do attitude. Maybe Mira’s loathing stems from some repressed feelings and-

SON OF A BITCH

Pink eyebrows digging up her forehead, unapologetic piercing reaching for her hairline, eyes bugging out of her head but somehow also squinted with utter bewilderment, corners of lips pulled down her chin like she had just seen a demon, arms crossed over her chest like it was guarding the flustered fragility of her heart – she looked frozen between a swear and a question.

And that question came out in an ungraceful, almost incoherent splutter that translated to,

“What the FUCK are you doing here?”

───  ⋅ ∙ ∘ ☽ ༓ ☾ ∘ ⋅ ⋅  ───

“What the FUCK are you doing here?”

Zoey easily translated the ungraceful, almost incoherent splutter as she slowly turned around the fluidity of chalk on gravel.

Only moments ago, she’d been running down the street with unlaced sneakers, a half-eaten dumpling and a dream. A dream that was finally coming true.

Her first mission!

Madam Jeong, or as she allows everyone to call her – Lisa – had held her back after lesson last week to inform her that the Min Ju – chairwoman of the Hunters division in Guardians Incorporated – had been impressed by her performance in lesson and offered her a position on a special mission. Zoey was so ecstatic that she had hardly even registered what Lisa told her about this so-called special mission. She was too busy with her celebratory breakdance to focus on anything other than the childish joy coursing through her veins.

While most children start middle school when they turn 12, Zoey had been torn apart from the inside out by her parents’ divorce.

Middle school was supposed to be when she finally found where she belonged.

Join the dance club, become better than her impossibly athletic brother Dae at surfing, make new friends, learn more turtle facts. She had a dream board under her bed about how perfect everything would be.

Then on a random day (Wednesday August 2^nd, 2013, but who’s counting?) she had been shoving that dream board into a suitcase and flying across the world to live in Korea with her grandparents accompanied by her father who had been present as a sperm doner and her brother Dae while her mother and other brother Min moved to England.

The Choi family of Burbank were no longer of Burbank or a family.

And then the blessing that she had been praying for since she step foot off the plane was answered in the most marvellous of ways.

Given far more independence than she should have had at that age, young Zoey was exploring Seoul alone on her skateboard when she crashed straight into a lamppost and landed in the scathing embrace of concrete.

Well, that wasn’t exactly a blessing or marvellous.

But as she was trying not to cry over her skinned knee, a flyer that had been discarded was thrown into her vision by the summer breeze. And yes, fine, trash to the face isn’t exactly a blessing or marvellous either yet on this flyer were the details for the dance competition that changed her life.

Somehow overcoming her crippling unmedicated anxiety to perform at the freestyle tournament, she had blown everyone away with explosive breakdancing that drew in scouts like mouths to a flame. One scout had stood out amongst the many with her bubbly charisma and an offer that just seemed magical – free enrolment into Generational Innovation.

Lo and behold, it was magical.

A magical layer protecting the world from evil demons and nurtured by hunters.

You can only imagine her excitement when the secret of the Sunlight Sisters had been revealed.

(Yet she remained painfully unaware about the tragedy that they had become. Everyone except for Min Ju, Celine and the council thought that Mi-Yeong had died at the hand of a demon. In a way, she had.)

Thanks to the ever so neglectful lenience of her family, Zoey was able to take the opportunity and grew into an impeccable young warrior. The years passed by in a vivid whirr of combat and colours but without failure, the most prominent shade had always been pink.

Pink that cascaded down the infuriatingly lithe and perfect figure of her arch nemesis, her mortal enemy, the bane of her existence:

Mira fucking Kotadoski.

Mira fucking Kotadoski who was currently stood in front of Zoey with an accusatory finger and a furious expression as if she was the one intruding when she had been their first!

“What am I doing here?” Zoey retorted with the indignance of a chihuahua, now also pointing despite her considerably less intimidating appearance. “More like what are you doing here, you crimson beanstalk of a bitch?”

A scathing response burned on the edge of Mira’s tongue as her skin flushed with fury at the audacity of this dwarfish dickhead but before she could spew fire, a jarringly familiar voice interrupted the pair.

“Attention!”

Heels snapped together, shoulders tensed and pulled back, head held high, arms held by sides, argument ceased.

The reaction was instinctive.

Suddenly distracted from the beginnings of yet another spat, Mira and Zoey both paled noticeably as they slowly eyed the incoming woman and gulped simultaneously.

 Madam Jeong was easily the most beloved of all their instructors due to her motherly sweetness that they both secretly craved and helpful guidance but that didn’t stop her from being terrifying when she wanted to.

And it truly was rare that she wanted to however both girls are still haunted by the time that they were punished for bickering too often with quite literally running ultramarathons everyday after lessons. It had only temporarily frozen their feud, but it was effectful enough for them to immediately paused any bickering on demand.

“Hi Lisa,” both girls chorused a greeting with sweating palms and smiles that made their cheeks ache which won a hearty laugh from Madam Jeong who shook her head fondly. “This isn’t a trick ultramarathon or whatever you’re currently theorizing. Relax girls.”

And they did relax. Heels separating, shoulders drooping and sagging forwards, heads lowering, arms parting from sides, argument continuing.

“As I was saying,” Mira spoke up before Zoey could get a word out first. “What the – and I cannot stress this enough – FUCK are you doing here? My partner was supposed to be a new placement!”

Never needing long to bite back, Zoey’s existential dread of an ultramarathon boiled back into P.G.I.F (Pink Giraffe Induced Fury). “Mine was supposed to be a new placement too and I am unfortunately very aware that you are not a new placement, you angsty fucking flamingo!”

A sharp intake of air was Mira’s protestation to the ludicrousness of the name she was so rudely called before scowling intensely in the way that her mother insisted would give her wrinkles by the time she was twenty. “Well, you trivia telling tosser, you’ve supposed wrong! This is my mission.”

“I have you know that people find my trivia delightful!” Zoey declared defensively, oblivious to the way that Mira secretly envied her vast sea of knowledge and remembered all the facts she’d told her over the years. “And if you’re so certain that this is your mission, then who is your partner, hm?”

Scornfully crossing her arms and leering her head close to Zoey’s in a manner that was purely aggressive and nothing else, Mira scoffed. “My partner is Ozechi Yoh!”

“Well, mine is Satori Kimodka!”

A beat passed. Mira’s face fell first. “Oh no.” Another beat passed. Zoey’s face fell second. “Oh no.” One more beat passed, they both turned with fallen faces to Madam Jeong who was grinning ear to ear with the cunning smugness of a demon. “Oh no!” They chorused with mutual mortification. A beat didn’t have the pass before their mentor was practically kicking her feet and giggling right there on the sidewalk. “Oh yes!”

“You anagrammed us!” Zoey gasped in horror, pointing at her teacher with a similar look you can imagine lambs get in the presence of a wolf in sheep’s clothing.

Mira just stood beside the girl turned ewe, her face resembling Wile E Coyote’s when he realizes there is no longer ground beneath his feet.

“Don’t look so backstabbed girls! Min Ju insisted that the two best junior hunters worked with me on this mission. It’s not my fault neither of you would’ve agreed to working together! I didn’t want you both to miss out on this opportunity to prove yourselves, I was looking out for you really.”

Before either girl could express their detestation for the situation, they were dragged in to a sleek black car by the eerily strong hands of Madam Jeong who was all too pleased with herself in the driver’s seat.

Mira withdrew into silence, ashamed that she had been tricked so cruelly while Zoey just muttered about anagrams and betrayal with a faraway look.

───  ⋅ ∙ ∘ ☽ ༓ ☾ ∘ ⋅ ⋅  ───

Lost in a dazed horror, Zoey latched onto the most familiar thing. Her hatred of Mira. Finally, being able to form a coherent thought, she turned to the other girl with a tone more scathing than she intended.

“Feeling hungover?”

“No, the nausea is just caused by your face.” “No, the headache began with your voice.” “No, but I could do with a drink to get through a conversation with you.”

Witty rebuttals are what Zoey expected, all too used to the insufferably quick insults that Mira could fire like bullets from a machine gun. A flinch is what Zoey received. And not just a casual ‘zoned out and pulled out of thoughts’ twitch but a genuine ‘fearful and consumed by nothing but thoughts’ jump.

For the first time in her 15 years of life, Zoey’s brain stopped. All desires to antagonize Mira came to a skidding halt as her heart lurched violently in her chest because what the actual fuck?

Smirking, sneering, scoffing – those were the three S’s that she knew her rival as. Scared? That had never happened before.

No matter how many times Zoey tormented her tormentor with sneak attacks or ambushes, Mira had never shown any form of weakness even for a second – during that double K.O sparring match, she had passed out with an intimidating scowl on her face.

But now, robbed of all her usual fire, Mira’s eyes glassed over, and she turned away without a word. Her brooding silence shifted into something fragile and hollow.

Chronically online and plagued by insomnia, Zoey had been on her phone when last night’s scandal made the headlines. She mistook it for just an embarrassing incident that wouldn’t affect Mira too badly and had jested with the intent to ignite their usual back and forth. When things only seemed to move back, her contempt faltered.

Slowly forcing her eyes to scan on any differences, Zoey suddenly fixated on the bruise spread over the side of Mira’s face and cogs slowly started turning. It certainly wasn’t rare for the other girl to be sporting some sort of injury, but it had always been received during training, so the shorter girl had simply assumed that’s where this current one came too.

Now, uncharacteristically focused and thoughtful, Zoey realized the wound seemed to be as emotional as it was physical as if it had been caused by someone who packed a punch and held the significance to pluck Mira’s strings.

It didn’t take her long to conclude.

Sung Ho.

Like everyone else, Zoey wasn’t aware of the extent to how horrible the Kotadoski family were to the daughter, but she’d overheard enough angry rants from Mira to Lisa to know that they weren’t great.

Without hesitating or doubting herself for once, Zoey sighed loudly.

“I saw that Sung Ho has a new movie coming out. Won’t be watching it, looks like shit.”

Mira, who had involuntarily glanced at the other girl when she spoke, immediately turned away to the conceal the sudden beginnings of a smile tugging at her lips.

Zoey saw it anyway, reflected by the window her rival had turned to, and despite her long standing loathing, she couldn’t help but think it was the most beautiful thing she’s ever seen.

Their hands rested lazily on the seat between them, their pinkies touched.

Neither of them moved closer.

Neither of the moved away either.

Notes:

Madam Lisa Jeong is the biggest Mirzoey shipper out there and she's been plotting polytrix for longer than you can imagine
Feedback is always appreciated just be nice!

Chapter 3: I wish I hated this

Summary:

'Most hot people only seem hot until they open their mouths, but this one hadn’t even opened her mouth!'

Notes:

When you have two fine shyts and find them both insufferable

Mira hates Zoey. Zoey hates Mira. It’s a simple fact of life. So why did Zoey insult her brother like she knew it would cheer her up? Why did the smile creeping onto her lips feel so easy despite being sat next to the person she loathes? Why did the brief contact of their pinkies spark electricity through Mira’s soul? Why d-

“Mira! You’ve just proper zoned out. Hello! Earth to pink panther’s evil twin!”

With the stiffness of rusted metal, Mira slowly turned her head to offer her sourest of scowls to the humanoid chihuahua prodding its finger into her cheek like she was a damn doorbell. “Poke me one more time.”

The grit in her voice and the fire in her eyes emphasised the threat prickling in her words, but Zoey just heard it as an invitation to continue. Tucking in her lips to present a mischievous smile, the raven-haired girl slowly extended her hand until it was half an inch away from Mira’s nose.

“I fucking dare you.” Poke.

Conveniently for both trainees, the sleek black car had been parked because Mira wouldn’t have hesitated to chase Zoey out of a moving vehicle onto a jampacked road. A delightfully menacing giggle and the slam of a door announced Zoey’s swift exit but the dull thud of a body on concrete announced her descent.

Immensely pleased with herself, the pink haired girl opened the door to peer down at her rival who was currently a tangle of limbs beside the tires.

“Shoe technicalities, frogspawn?” Mira asked smoothly, sounding all too pleased with herself as Zoey immediately looked down at her sneakers and the most offended expression to ever be expressed contorted her face comically.

Looking down at her tied laces as if they tied themselves and personally plotted her downfall, Zoey spluttered out a series of incoherent questions. “What? When? Why? How?”

All too happy to answer, Mira leaned relaxed on her seat with faux casualness, examining her nails like they were the most interesting thing in the world with the sole intention of getting under the other girl’s skin. “Your shoelaces are tied. About 5 minutes ago. Because I felt like it. I just, you know, tied them together.”

With the cunningness of a fox, Mira grinned slyly as she couldn’t help but feel smug. Last year Zoey had done a percentage better in a stealth exercise and never let her live it down, this prank felt like restoring rightful order while she prepared for a plethora of pink related insults and possible biting.

“Whatever.”

A beat passed. Then two. The triumph coating Mira’s facial expressions slipped away as confusion took its place. No pink dolphin carcass? No Peppa Pig’s skinsuit? No stepped-on worm? No Patrick star fish’s dumbest relative? Just whatever?

That restored, rightful order suddenly felt broken and wrong as she looked down to see the pained embarrassment tinging Zoey’s cheeks. Oh… her eyes eventually landed on the nasty wound staining the other girl’s knee through her black sweatpants.

Groaning exasperatedly but doing it all the same, Mira fished through her black and red checked backpack to pull out an impressively stocked first aid kit.

For someone so reckless, she was impressively prepared.

As soon as her fingertips touched Zoey’s skin, that electricity sparked through her soul immediately like fire coursing through her veins, but she stomped out the flames vehemently. No. No complicated feelings allowed on her first mission. La la la she can’t hear you!

“Stop looking so shocked,” Mira huffed in as she knelt beside the victim of her prank reluctantly, but her voice lacked its usual bite. She considered biting just to hide the lack of aggression before deciding against it. For now. “If I really do have to suffer through a mission with you, I can’t have you whining over scratches and slowing me down.”

But nothing could mask the gentleness of her movements as she rolled up Zoey’s trouser leg and tied the bandage into a neat bow or the guilt hovering on her expression.

“These are against the uniform policy, you know.” Mira pointed out dryly only to roll her eyes when her ripped tights were frowned upon. “Whatever.”

Without even thinking, she pulled back and held out her hand. It hung in the distance between them. She tried not to care when she thought her literal hand would be rejected. She tried not to care when it was accepted a moment later. She tried not to care when Zoey’s fingers intertwined with hers and the gesture just felt right.

But deep down, she did care. A lot.

As if her brain was buffering, Zoey stood and stared dumbly at her hand held with such uncharacteristic care before her face heated into an unhealthy shade of red, pulling away like she was electrocuted. Mira tried not to mourn the contact.

Stuck in silence for a moment, the girls walked towards the looming campus. With the absence of their usual feud and the presence of their hands lingering so closely together, they almost looked like friends. Or maybe something more.

Well, until Mira’s blank expression gained its colour back and her cheeks creased with a smirk. “How was your trip?”

The push was so sudden that Mira stumbled into a trashcan, gripping it like a lifeline so she wouldn’t fall.

“Mine was fine, how was yours?” Zoey asked sweetly, her tone singsong and smug.

Contempt for that stupidly pretty stupid face flared in Mira’s heart as she scowled in a way that would certainly wrinkle her face by the time she was 20. Never one to be down for long, she quite literally lunged onto the smiling demon and the two erupted into a mess of shoves and pinches and insults. So, the usual.

“They’ll get there eventually.” Lisa, who had watched the whole scene with knowing amusement, shook her head fondly and spoke beneath her breath. Whether she intended to be heard or not, Mira’s sharp ears picked up the words and offered her mentor a flushed face of questioning dread. “I didn’t say anything ducky.”

A protest formed on Mira’s tongue but it was quickly swept away by another wave of height focused insults when Zoey snuck in another poke to her cheek.

The former matchmaker in Lisa just sighed exasperatedly but she knew that all good things take time.

───  ⋅ ∙ ∘ ☽ ༓ ☾ ∘ ⋅ ⋅  ───

“Was she always so…” Mira began slowly.

Zoey finished quickly, “emotionally closed off?”

Trying not to focus on how well her supposed rival anticipated her speech, Mira nodded as she turned to Lisa who was strolling beside the theorizing trainees calmly.

The trio had just met with Celine to discuss the terms of their investigation and despite being lost in a starstruck daze, even Zoey had observed just how stiff the woman seemed for an ex-idol and huntress.

“No, not that I’m aware of.” Lisa shook her head slowly with an uncharacteristic solemness to her tone. “She was one of the most vibrant in our division, then she retired so suddenly and became…” she paused to gesture to the sleek but ever so bland school. “This.”

Clearly in deep thought, Zoey nodded before tilting her head. “So, Celine became a headteacher. Min Ju moved up ranks until she became chairwoman. What did Mi-Yeong do?”

The moment of hesitation stretched endlessly as something ever so sorrowful moulded a frown onto Lisa’s usually smiling face, her eyes full of burdensome knowledge. An unfamiliar voice interrupted her response but as they turned to the source, both girls couldn’t help but doubt that they’d tell them the truth anyway.

“There you two are!”

The interruption called in humoured relief as the girls jumped violently despite their years of training in fighting literal demons.

Accompanying the exclamation, a man appeared at the end of the hallway and quickly approached them. He had a curved jawline, silky locks and black fuzz above his smiling lips. This man appeared so endlessly friendly that even Mira forgot that he was a total stranger. But then she remembered and by default, he was an enemy.

Instinctively, the tallest of the teenage duo straightened her posture and crossed her arms, eyes narrowing suspiciously despite his kind introduction.

“Hello, hello,” he announced with a grin despite sounding rather breathless. “My name is Mr Kim, but you can both just call me Bobby!”

As if being delightfully friendly was a primal instinct that possessed Zoey, she automatically greeted him with kindness.

“Hi Bobby!” she beamed, her frog hat toppling off her head due to the energy of her movements. “I’m Zoey and this is Mira!”

“What is this girl made of?” Mira asked herself exasperatedly but still instinctively picked up the fallen hat and returned it to Zoey’s head with a plop, sparing her a glance that could almost be described as fond. “Sugar spice and everything nice?”

Despite his sweetness, Mira still maintained a level of wariness as she settled her sharp gaze on Mr Kim – Bobby.

“Hey.”

Not at all fazed by the dry greeting, Bobby accepted their responses with flourishing friendliness.

“Hi girls. I’m the pastoral and music teacher since we’re just a tad understaffed, and the board will do nothing about it…”

His voice trailed off into fatigued frustration, but he picked it back up with a genuinely kind albeit tired tone.

“It is such a pleasure to have new students! Now please do follow me to my office so we can get you settled.”

Looking to Lisa for permission, Zoey and Mira only found themselves looking at each other through the space their mentor had been in only moments ago. The eye contact lingered a moment too long for the hatred between them.

Completely unbeknownst to Bobby who was already leading the way, iridescent rings rippled around them in hues of warm colours, even flickering gold occasionally.

But that’s something for later

Then as if he was incapable of taking more than a breath between speaking and moving, Bobby was shepherding the loitering girls through doors and hallways quicker than you can ask “What are we?”

And it wasn’t long before the unlikely trio were sat in a cosy office tucked away in the middle of the campus. Fairy lights trailed the perimeter of the ceiling. Colouring pages and an endless amount of stationary were generously placed in on a shelf in the corner.

Fidget toys were practically overspilling from a yellow tub that Zoey already had her hand buried in before smiling sheepishly when Bobby encouraged her to help herself while Mira eyed a cluster of Thank You! cards pinned to a cork board which sported a plethora of pride flags, women’s rights and BLM posters with some fun stickers presenting terrible animal puns.

Ever so slowly, that foreign smile crept back onto her face and hesitantly curled her lips.

Mira got the feeling that Bobby was popular but in a very different way to her revered family.

Gently pulling the pink haired girl out of her thoughtful observations, Bobby placed down a paper in front of Mira and Zoey on his desk.

“Right, I’ll just see who is scheduled to tour you both.” His stubby finger slid over the timetable with curiosity before he chirped happily. “Ah lovely, I’ll call see if she is available.”

He exclaimed, already making a politely cheerful request into his walkie talkie before deflating like a balloon.

“She is not,” he informed Mira and Zoey who blinked at him blankly before he explained regretfully. “The student council leader, I was hoping she could tour you as I am rather busy, but it seems she is too. Never mind, come on girls!”

───  ⋅ ∙ ∘ ☽ ༓ ☾ ∘ ⋅ ⋅  ───

‘Energy cannot be created or restored, only transferred.’

Bobby knew that law of physics and chemistry as well as she knew the back of his palm. The fact was impossible to forget after he had spent weeks with his neck craned over several science textbooks throughout middle school but still, she found herself doubting it.

Clearly, whoever discovered that rule had clearly never met Zoey Choi.

This girl seemed to create her own energy that was simply powered by trivia and turtles and turtle trivia. In the last ten minutes, Bobby has learned about the anatomy, sleeping patterns and habitat of green sea turtles.

Did you know that the sex of a green sea turtle is determined by the temperature of the sand that the eggs are laid in? Bobby did not.

But he now knew that and much more and he certainly wasn’t complaining. This hyper teen reminded him of how he used to be – someone who had been told to shut up so many times that they fit as much as possible into one conversation – and he was happy to offer her that safe space.

Even though Mira still counted Bobby as an enemy by default, the usually unforgiving girl couldn’t help but give him the benefit of the doubt.

The way his eyes, kind and gentle, flicked over to Zoey for a moment and a smile curled his lips so easily with amused fondness brought a newfound lightness to Mira’s usually heavy heart.

Growing up, adults – except for Lisa who was still nowhere to be seen – never gave her the time-of-day so she stopped giving it to them. But this teacher seemed more than willing to listen to chatter, so willing that she almost joined the conversation when the topic shifted to dance – something she was very knowledgeable about.

Before she could decide to put herself out there or keep herself locked up, her opening mouth closed when something knocked against her shoulder carelessly. At first, Mira just assumed Zoey was being a little shit again but said little shit was currently teaching Bobby about the origins of breakdancing so she turned confusedly to see-

OH, GOOD LORD

Breath caught in her throat and pierced brows shot up her face as Mira’s wide eyes were blessed with the sight of someone that could only be described as a masterpiece of a girl.

Not as towering as herself but still noticeably tall, stood this pretty stranger with an unwaveringly straight posture. Broad shoulders and thick arms filled out a button up white shirt that neatly wrapped around a perfect toros, unable to fully conceal the distinct muscle coated by a moderate layer of fat. A cool gaze with guarded complexity and a burning soul, her face seemed to be moulded by the generous hands of Aphrodite.

Just barely managing to drag her eyes off this statuesque beauty and to the side of her, Mira realized that she wasn’t the only one feeling like this. Zoey was stood frozen like Medusa had stoned her with her eyes stuck to the stranger’s everything as if she was afraid that she’d would disappear if she blinked.

“Girls?” The kind voice Mira and Zoey now knew as Bobby’s called curiously as they blinked away their admiring daze and turned to the teacher with herculean struggle. He chuckled amusedly when he received their attention. “I was saying that this is your student council leader.”

Wide eyed and awestruck, the junior hunters nodded dumbly with mutual adoration before Mira finally formed an appropriate and coherent thought.

“I’m Mira,” she introduced with an awkward swallow. “And that’s Zoey.”

Usually, Zoey would be indignant to anyone speaking for her, but she genuinely couldn’t work her mouth right now. Meeting one of her favourite musicians a decade after she retired had already been such a brain altering experience but the sight of someone so gorgeously handsome and handsomely gorgeous completely fried her systems.

The student council leader tilted her head slowly and the girls couldn’t help but hold their breaths waiting for the sound of her voice like it was salvation. Slowly she parted her lips to speak, and it took all their self-restraint to not lean in. And finally, she… nodded.

Wait? What?

Zoey and Mira were left gawking as the stranger simply nodded in stiff greeting and walked past them. Something comically akin to grief flooded Zoey’s heart as she clutched it dramatically due to the genuine ache she felt while Mira’s face flushed as pink as her hair and she burned with offense.

How dare she? The absolute audacity! Growing up in a family of conventionally attractive horrible people, the rebellious teen learned early on that most hot people only seem hot until they open their mouths, but this one hadn’t even spoken! It was ruined in indifferent silence!

If the purple haired prick had the manners to introduce herself, she’d be cursing her name. Despite urge she had to summon her Gok-Do and demand an apology, a name and a number from the speechless stranger, Mira couldn’t help but pause for a moment.

Purple hair?

She blinked a few times as her mind slowed pathetically. Yes, she herself has bright pink tresses but it’s clearly dye. The student council leader’s had seemed eerily natural.

“Don’t take it personally girls,” Bobby laughed apologetically with a light-hearted tone. “Rumi has only recently began engaging in conversation with me and I’ve taught her for years! Lovely girl but really not a talker.”

Mira most certainly took it personally as a grudge smothered any attraction while Zoey nodded forlornly, echoing Bobby as if she were recently widowed.

“Rumi.”

───  ⋅ ∙ ∘ ☽ ༓ ☾ ∘ ⋅ ⋅  ───

“Stupid muscles, stupid form fitting uniform, stupid authoritative presence,” Mira grumbled silently, her focus on whatever lesson she was suffering through completely minimal to her newfound hatred for student council leaders. “Stupid purple hair, stupid, stupid, stupid!”

The day passed by in a blur of classes that Mira didn’t pay attention to and introductions that weren’t nearly as impactful as the one she didn’t receive. Thankfully the end of this dreaded school day drew closer as the teacher droned on about topics that didn’t even register.

Only two things occupied her head currently, her mission and her grudge with a certain lavender scented girl.

(Yes, she effortlessly remembered how impossibly good she smelled, so what?)

Driven mad by the latter, Mira forced herself to focus on the former. Her mission. Her first real mission. She wasn’t going to let some brat ruin here thrill for this task.

Identify the anomaly and terminate it. Junior hunters were usually never allowed to participate in such hands-on operations outside of basic training. Only thinking about that brought a smug smirk to the corners of her lips.  

Despite how indifferent she likes to act, deep down Mira thrived off feeling special and training for the last few years to become a guardian, a hunter, easily hit the mark.

Now she even had a communication device disguised as a wristwatch to report her findings directly to Min Ju! Suddenly a third thing occupied her head as she remembered who also had a special wristwatch… Her scowl found Zoey immediately.

The black-haired girl was sat across the room with earphones hidden beneath her dumb frog bucket hat. Unsurprisingly, Zoey spotted the glare then returned it with a taunting tongue sticking out as she mouthed something along the lines of “Don’t make me poke you again, beanstalk.”

And despite the annoyance prickling throughout her entire being, Mira couldn’t help but feel her heart flutter. For once this long-standing feud seemed less hatred and more banter. Its as if being forced to have a common goal that required their combined efforts caused something lessened the contempt between them.

Maybe Lisa was right. (Lisa, as always, was certainly right.)

───  ⋅ ∙ ∘ ☽ ༓ ☾ ∘ ⋅ ⋅  ───

“Are you sure Celine is alright housing us?” Zoey questioned meekly as she trailed uncertainly behind Mira and Lisa.

Surviving a full day of school with only a few snickers and no signs of the relentless bullying that she endured throughout elementary school already felt like a blessing. Temporarily living under the roof of a retired idol was simply too good to be true.

“Oh, she isn’t alright with it.” Lisa, who was now dressed in the school nurse’s uniform for her undercover identity since she couldn’t exactly pass as a new student, chimed happily. “But Min Ju argued it’d be unfair for us to have to travel unnecessarily twice a day and here we are!”

And yes, they there were. In paradise.

Zoey’s face visibly dropped in absolute awe as she reached the gates, staring disbelievingly at the large expanse of property.

The largest hanok that she’s ever seen stood before her, surrounded by land that seemed to stretch on for miles. In the near distance stood a gorgeous white gazebo with white slopes and arches. Beside it was a rippling stream and with a wooden bridge and well-maintained gardens weaved between a few other buildings as a dense wood stretched into the horizon.

Mira, born into a wealthy family that substituted love for money, was unfazed.

She’s been to nicer summer camps than this.

“Right, lets go then.” Lisa hummed happily, the fleeting sorrow from this morning buried and forgotten, as she knocked on the door for a few times.

Celine opened it with a look that could only be described as morbid disdain while Mira and Zoey shared a rare moment of mutual amusement, their snickers silenced by bitten lips and silent smiles.

Just when Zoey thought this day would never end, the sun finally fell, and darkness blanketed the world. Despite having the personality of a sunflower, she couldn’t help but enjoy the night. Yes, she hardly ever got any sleep due to crippling insomnia that was most certainly caused by the anxiety that plagued her every waking moment. But everything just felt slower during late hours, like she could finally turn off.

Well, she could usually do that. It was quite hard to relax and turn off in this current situation.

“Honestly, I haven’t prepared well for your accommodation due to the short notice and my tight schedule. There are plenty of rooms in my house but only two of them are occupied frequently.” Celine admitted stiffly.

Mira and Zoey were too quickly being consumed by dread to question who else other than Celine frequently occupied her house. They shook their heads slowly in united horror as they anticipated what was coming.

“I’ll have my staff prepare another you all individual rooms for tomorrow night but for now we have two guest rooms available for tonight. Lisa may take one and you girls may take the other.”

“Or the girls could have separate rooms tonight and I could sleep with you.” Lisa offered innocently despite the smug glint when Celine all but wheezed with an immediately red face and wide eyes. “No? Okay.”

(The junior hunters were too mortified at the prospect of sharing a room to notice that interaction)

So, here Zoey was, reluctantly following Mira towards the room they’d been given. Her head pounded, her brain whirred, her body tensed.

“Jeez, calm down,” Mira eventually huffed when she couldn’t take the deafeningly silent spiral anymore, opening the door with a sigh. She hated this as much as Zoey, but she was too exhausted to make a fuss. “At least we’ll have separate- oh for fucksake you are kidding me!”

And no, Mira was not being kidded.

This was happening.

A single bed.

Teeth brushed, showers taken, clothes changed. Now Mira and Zoey sat on the edge of the bed as if the other carried a contagious disease.

Wrecked by the long day, especially this morning’s incident – the slap, Mira caved first. A tired sigh trailed from her lips as she muttered a plethora of curses but still yanked Zoey’s arm as she lay down.

“It’s not weird if you don’t make it weird, weirdo.” Mira mumbled exasperatedly as she turned off the lamp and stared at the window like it was a tempting escape route while Zoey eventually settled in beside her, their backs touching.

Once again, three things occupied Mira’s mind.

This time, the mission wasn’t one of them.

1) How difficult it would be to escape through the window and never return.

2) The way Zoey’s strained breathing eventually eased to snores as her back pressed into her own. The way she tried so hard to hate it but didn’t move away.

3) The fact that her grudge with insufferably pretty, silent student council member felt soft at the edges despite how much she tried to keep them sharp.

Eventually lulled by the steady sounds of Zoey’s breathing and Rumi’s lavender scent that somehow still lingered, Mira fell asleep.

It’s not hard to guess who starred in her dreams.

Notes:

Lisa Jeong is the biggest Mirzoey shipper out there.
Lisa is also lowkey a freak for Celine, Celine can't handle allat.
The next chapter is Rumi centric :3
Feedback is always welcome, just be kind ! <3

Chapter 4: Apologies be damned

Summary:

'Celine didn’t deserve thanking. They both knew that. Rumi still said and meant it anyway.'

Notes:

Rumi doesn't know that Mira and Zoey, the girls she met yesterday, are the junior hunters because she missed them coming in and hadn't been shown their files.
just a heads up that this chapter made with three different chapters from two different of my own works so if the writing seems familiar, that's why! I haven't stolen anyone else's writing, I'm just lazy and resourceful lmao :3

In a glorious glow, morning came. Bathing Celine’s large expanse of property with its generous shine, the sun rose to wake the world.

But someone was already awake, not in need of the golden alarm clock.

Someone that had been waiting for the first ray of light since the last had faded last night. Someone with naturally violet coloured hair and patterns hidden beneath her silk pyjamas.

Someone given the beautifully simple name of Rumi by a loving mother who wasn’t gifted enough time to be loving or a mother.

“Only five?” she sighed wearily, hovering her phone above her face with a stiff hand before dropping it beside her with a huff. She didn’t need to leave for school until 7AM. So, she had two hours to kill. Deciding that if she lay awake in this bed any longer, she might turn to a wooden plank and miss 7AM completely.

With a huff of exasperation, she stretched her limbs and rolled out of bed, her feet finding the familiar rug and sinking into it as she stood. Smacking her lips together in slow claps as a yawn trailed through them, she began her usual morning routine – usual meaning constant, it’s been unchanged since she was 7 and she plans to keep it that way.

Firstly, she brushed her teeth with a specifically mild flavoured toothpaste because everything else tastes too spicy on her judgemental tongue. Secondly, she washed her face with a scentless hydrating cream then splashed water on her face 3 times. Always 3 times. A sense of calm cleansed her uneasiness and a peaceful expression settled on her face. After leaving the bathroom, she headed to her wardrobe that was tucked patiently in the corner of her spotless bedroom.

That peace was slowly wrinkled and discarded from her face as she opened the doors and saw what was inside.

It was nothing surprising, just her clothes. Her clothes that most notably shared one thing in common – they were covering.

Joggers, leggings and jeans – no shorts.

Jumpers, hoodies and long-sleeved tops – no vests or crop tops.

The sight made the secret streaks littered across her body writhe shamefully beneath her sleepwear as she held herself for a moment, her hands instinctively crossing paths as they slid to her shoulders in a self-soothing embrace. This was a habit that formed when her patterns had expanded over her and Celine refrained from touching her.

The older woman’s hand that used to caress her with already hesitant, regretful love began hovering like she was a flame. Then it wasn’t long before any physical affection became a distant memory.

So, young and neglected emotionally from her only parental figure, Rumi had started to hug herself in moments of overwhelm. Moments that came often yet fleeting, weaving through her walls of determined composure, and always accompanied by the words that haunted her. Most beings with demonic blood were controlled by the sly, gravelly taunts of Gwi-Ma. But a different voice echoed distressfully in her head.

Celine. Her reluctant fiduciary, her firm instructor.

The woman who had raised her but always treated her with mentorship instead of motherliness.

Her voice was so clear in the hunter-in-training’s head that she flinched, fearing that the older woman was somehow behind her, speaking into her ears. “When the Honmoon is sealed, all demons will be gone from this world. And so will your patterns.” Instead of reassuringly cradling the little girl that had just asked if she too would be killed by hunters, Celine had simply reminded her of her duty.

A duty that shouldn’t have weighed on such little shoulders.

Following the memory like salt in a wound, the most stinging of the retired performer’s lessons reared its ugly head. 

“Our faults and fears must never be seen.” 

The not so discrete subtext of the words weighed on the hybrid’s weary heart – she must hide, she mustn’t reveal the mistake of her birth for it would only ruin things more than her existence already did.

That phrase had a chokehold on her since early youth, and it grips her still as a 15-year-old. Celine had never physically harmed her but sometimes her words cut deeper than any strike could, and Rumi doesn’t even think she meant them to – which makes it worse. Unsurprisingly, Celine had little awareness or care for the fragility of juvenility. She’d never wanted children – the thought made her stomach twist like a demon was toying with it.

But a demon wasn’t playing with her insides, it was playing with her best friend’s.

A demon – something hardly even alive, never mind human – not only sleeping with a Sunlight Sister but reproducing with her! She didn’t even know how it was possible but specifics like that hardly mattered when she was left with a dead Mi-yeong and a half demon baby. The retired performer had been entirely unprepared to raise someone, so she did what she knew, what she understood, and she rejected what she didn’t.

The semi monstrous girl didn’t receive motherliness, she received mentorship. Learning to fight at the age she should’ve learned to ride a bike or play baseball. To Celine, Rumi was Mi-yeong’s daughter. She was the offspring of a beast. She was a future hunter destined to turn the Honmoon golden.

But she was never ever a child.

All these thoughts floated around Rumi’s brain like rain clouds as she undressed, folding her pyjamas neatly and placing them on her neatly made bed. When she had showered earlier in her routine, she covered the mirror with her towel as she always did and now, as she turned back to the wardrobe, her eyes were already on the floor, avoiding the mirror that hung on the door.

After years upon years of being told that the patterns across her body were not a part of her but the imprints of all things evil, she couldn’t look at herself bare anymore.

“Our faults and fears must never be seen.” She recited numbly; the words etched into every weakness she hid, carved invisibly along her markings that were thrumming with deep indigo as they were robotically hidden by her outfit for the day, expressing the shame and misery that clawed at her heart no matter how much she tried to ignore it.

And she did try, she always did.

But Celine had taught her that some feelings cling to you like fog on a road, inconvenient and bothersome. Taught her that she mustn’t get lost in that fog but instead push through it like a true hunter. Taught her that the Golden Honmoon was her priority, not her wellbeing.

So, even in the privacy of her own bedroom, Rumi suppressed her emotions. She released herself from the pitiful one person embrace and decided that she needed to clear her head, that these feelings were inconvenient and bothersome.

Resorting to her usual and only release of emotions, she quickly finished her routine and headed outside to the combat patio.

───  ⋅ ∙ ∘ ☽ ༓ ☾ ∘ ⋅ ⋅  ───

When the fresh morning air hit her face, the teenager relaxed slightly. Though the misery was still there of course. It's always there, always watching, always touching. Often it doesn’t consume her, allowing her to function despite her burdens but it's constantly behind her, holding her shoulders and breathing down her neck.

Sometimes it's staring unblinkingly from a distance, nothing noticeable and not an outburst but enough to tell her "I'm always here. I won't leave. No matter how terrible you are."

And eventually that becomes comforting, a promise instead of a threat, constant, trustworthy.

That bittersweet emotion was currently the only thing keeping her company as her punches become sloppier. The day had barely woken yet here Rumi was, relentlessly launching her fists at a Wing Chun dummy even though she’s almost certain that splinters have dug into her knuckles.

“Come on, Rumi,” the girl wise and burdened beyond her years urged herself despite the bruises blooming across her hands. She really was determined to a fault. “Come on, just a bit longer!”

After landing a few more hits, she jogs back to perform a swift Bal-bakkwo Chagi. She feigns a front kick with her left leg before attacking the abused wood with her right. It was flawless, perfection really. But that wasn’t a word in Rumi’s vocabulary despite being fluent in both Korean and English. On the other hand, ‘nearly’ and ‘again’ were commonly spoken by her internal monologue that sounded too much like Celine for her own comfort.

This was purely coincidental though.

Of course, it has nothing to do with the years upon years that her guardian spent drilling lessons of formidability into her brain since it was young enough to process words. Of course, it’s completely unlinked to the phrase that sticks to all her worries like a package deal.

‘Our faults and fears must never be seen.’

And Rumi knew what the words meant, a not so gentle reminder that she must never let her deepest flaw be revealed. That the jagged edges across her skin and family tree must be hidden from the light until they’re mended; fixed. Feeling smothered by the sun’s heat and the anxiety coursing through her like a stampede of wild horses, she restlessly dragged the long-sleeved jumper off her sweating body in a desperate attempt to cool down.

It worked. But then she saw the patterns twirling down her biceps.

Just seeing them tore her lethal focus into shreds. Shaking her head as if to clear it of the storm brewing within, she attempted another switch kick, but her legs ended up tangling mid-air and she fell onto the concrete with a dull thud.

Groaning lowly, she allowed the mistake to unravel her, and she collapsed like a broken table. The thickness of her braid cushioned her head on the hard surface and sleep nearly came for her, tugging at her eyelids like an old friend gently pulling her along into dreams that almost always became nightmares.

But then her sharp senses picked up the steady fall of sandals against the pathway leading up to the combat deck that she was starfished on.

Celine.

As if her weary body had been electrocuted by lighting and jumpstarted, she burst into movement. Scrambling onto her feet and swaying her head side to side, her dragon braid swinging along with the frantic gesture, she searched for her jumper in hopes to cover up before her mentor came.

Too late.

A cough caught her attention, and she whipped around to see Celine already standing there. Long black hair, sharp unreadable features, poised perfect presence. She was such a familiar woman to Rumi. Yet as the years passed, every day it felt like she was looking at someone quickly becoming a stranger.

Before Rumi could even greet her and attempt casualty, her arm was grabbed. Not roughly, but firmly. She swallowed a gulp and slowly looked up at the taller woman before looking back down like a scolded dog when she saw the expression on her face. Disapproval. That hurt more than anger, sorrow or fear because all her life, the purple-haired girl has only ever wanted to appease Celine, to receive her praise and finally know what maternal love felt like.

“It’s just really hot,” she stammered and tried not to focus on the stare burning holes into her arms. “Nobody saw.”

“But someone could have. You know we have those damn junior hunters staying with us!” Celine responded instantly without missing a beat, her grip tightening as if was seriously considering pulling off Rumi’s arms to get rid of the patterns. “They could have seen you!”

“Would that be so bad?” Rumi asked before she could stop herself and she could tell that Celine was caught off guard by the sharp intake of air she took but it was too late to take it back now, so she continued desperately. “I… I was just thinking that these girls… I know I haven’t met them yet but maybe I wouldn’t have to hide from them, and I could just be… honest. Maybe they would understand? They do already know about the Honmoon and demons…”

“No.”

The word was unhesitant. It slid off Celine’s tongue like a bullet from a gun. She didn’t intend to shoot Rumi with her answer, but she wasn’t unsure of it either.

“Nothing can change until your patterns are gone. Nobody can know about what you are but especially not anyone from Guardians Incorporated. You know this, Rumi.”

Any other 15-year-old girl would instantly argue, wouldn’t put up with this treatment, wouldn’t accept the injustice of having to hide just because of her parent’s forbidden romance.

But Rumi wasn’t any other 15-year-old girl.

She was hardly even a girl.

She has half-demon. She was a hybrid, a mongrel.

A sigh trailed from Celine’s lips as she released her arm to pinch her own eyebrows.

Sometimes when she looked at Rumi, the composed expression pinned to Celine’s face would falter. It would light up with joyful familiarity for a moment. Then it would dim with disappointment. She looked identical to her mother in all the ways that haunt Celine and make what’s left of her heart ache. That subtle pout on the girl’s lips, Mi-yeong had the same one… Mi-yeong used to have the same one.

Clearing her throat and pulling her mask of indifference back on, Celine shook her head and calmly replied. “It’s okay.” A second passed, then two, then three. “Just don’t think of such fantasies again. Everything must stay hidden until the Honmoon is sealed.”

By ‘Everything’ Rumi knew that she meant ‘You’. She must stay hidden until she is fixed. Which meant right now she was broken. Ruined by the people that created her.

And it isn’t even her duty! The junior hunters are the girls who are supposed to train their childhoods away and turn the Honmoon golden, not her. But still, she never voiced that complaint because she already knew the reason.

Ever since Rumi was young, Celine trained her as a hunter despite not being allowed by Guardian Incorporated. The retired idol insisted that if she could turn the Honmoon golden, it wouldn’t matter if she was half-demon anymore.

And that’s what Rumi wanted most in the entire world –freedom.

Freedom from the patterns that writhe beneath her close and trap her soul like it owes jail time. Freedom from the darkest thoughts that whisper when she’s alone and tempt her with permanent rest. Freedom accompanied by all the things she was deprived of – pride, friendship, romance, love.

So, Rumi had worked so incredibly hard to earn that freedom. To deserve the things that she knew deep down she shouldn’t have to fight for and should’ve been given in the first place.

Guilt stirred in Rumi’s gut as she remembered how stupid it was for her to even consider letting Guardians Incorporated know that she had been more affected by her demon ancestry than Celine led them to believe.

Rumi was never told the full story about the night that left a scar on Min Ju’s eye, a permanent limp to Celine’s right leg and a baby named Rumi or the threat of her termination.

But during her brief rebellious tween years, she had found enough hidden files in Celine’s office to know how dangerous her identity being revealed could be.

Emotionally beaten and burdened, Rumi nodded slowly, gaze stuck to the floor.

“I’m sorry,” ‘for thinking that I deserved to be anything more than a shadow, for existing, for being alive.’  “It was just a thought.”

Celine’s hand lifted half an inch for half a second, so close to reaching out and giving Rumi’s trembling hand a reassuring squeeze.

Maybe a hug. Maybe a kiss on the head. Maybe an apology for being such an awful excuse of a parental figure. Maybe any evidence of the love she had buried deep down. The only definitely is that those things definitely weren’t happening.

“You’re dismissed.”

Not unkind but not kind either.

Celine’s dismissal was one of Rumi’s most unfavoured things. She didn’t complain though, she didn’t linger and hope for anything more. She just nodded, subtly avoiding eye contact then headed for nearest shower, desperate to wash away the shame.

“Rumi?”

Rumi waited at the edge of the combat deck, glancing over her shoulder and forcing her eyes to meet Celine.

For a moment, they both saw Mi-yeong in each other.

“Yes?”

“I know that I’ve failed you all these years and as consequence, I’ve failed your mother. But I love you as much as I can love anything which just isn’t enough, and I am so sorry for that.”

“There’s leftover kimchi in the fridge for you, your mother’s recipe.”

It was a crumb of fondness, a morsel of connection. Rumi still devoured it. Her heart felt tender and fragile as she weakly covered its inconvenient vulnerability with a polite smile.

“Thank you, Celine.”

Celine didn’t deserve thanking. They both knew that. Rumi still said and meant it anyway.

───  ⋅ ∙ ∘ ☽ ༓ ☾ ∘ ⋅ ⋅  ───

Hot. Almost too hot. Hot enough to feel like burning but not hot enough to burn.

That’s how Rumi enjoyed her showers. Well, enjoyed isn’t quite the word. Liked? No, that wasn’t right either. Preferred is much more fitting. Favoured suited her feelings too.

She didn’t like or dislike things, she just favoured or unfavoured them.

Showers, especially heated ones, were one of those favoured things for several reasons that she has thought about thoroughly.

Firstly, she could decide how hot or cold the water was. Controlling the heat gave her something rare and precious – choice. Rumi gets very few choices. As pathetic as it may be, showering is the closest she has ever gotten (and likely will ever get) to relishing in freedom.

Secondly, the liquid pouring over her body soothed her in the silliest of ways. It’d take some twisted techniques for the teenager to ever admit this, but she found the pressure something akin to the hugs and other affections that she’s always been deprived of. Even now, standing alone in her own bathroom, she couldn’t help the embarrassed tinge to her cheeks. It just felt like such a silly reason.

A little sad, maybe a lot sad, but she wasn’t allowed to dwell on those sorts of feelings. Why? As previously stated, Rumi gets very few choices. This restriction is unsurprisingly something she didn’t get a choice in. So, she had settled on finding it silly. Not sad.

Thirdly, being naked.

Slipping out of clothes that covered every inch of her body like plasters over a nasty wound felt relieving, like she could breathe again after holding in a sigh of fatigue for so long.

However, it was arguably also one of those unfavoured things because she had to face the disgusting reality of her own existence, of what she was. A demon. Well, as she was reminded constantly by her guardian growing up, a half-demon but that 50% had still been more than enough to stain a once beautiful legacy.

A legacy that was her duty to uphold so she could atone for the sin she was born as. Sins slithered like Satan’s snakes all over her athletic figure in the form of indigo patterns littered over her limbs and torso.

Thankfully, they hadn’t reached her face or hands. Yet.

Being completely covered by her markings was likely just the doomed inevitable.

But there was a sliver of hope. A singular chance to save herself from hell and finally become worthy of heaven. The Golden Honmoon.

If she could find excel above the GI junior hunters, if she could kill enough demons without thinking too much about whether she deserved the same fate, if she could turn the iridescent rings gleam glorious yellow and prove that her demon DNA didn’t make her less than or wicked… then she would be free.

Freedom is something that Rumi has only experienced fleetingly through control, choice, dreams. But, one day if she were to fulfil her destiny, she hopes to feel it through love. Beautiful, unconditioned, love that didn’t demand or shun, only accept and adapt.

Romantic, familial, platonic – she would be grateful for any.

If she was gifted love, she would never want again. The longing that ached within her heart, buried by obligation, would be satisfied then finally, she would be free.

Freed and loved.

Oh, what a joy that would be.

“Don’t walk on the clouds, it’s a long way down when you fall.”

A lesson she had been taught as soon as she was able to learn echoed in her head, unexpected and unfavoured.

Most demonic creatures were haunted by the gravelly whispers of Gwi-Ma, but Rumi was plagued by someone else’s voice. Celine. 

Their conversation from earlier this morning replayed in her head relentlessly until there was no room for the fantasies only ugly truths.

Yanked out of her dreams and thrust back into the cruel reality that is life, Rumi shook her head slightly as if to remove all the unallowed sadness from her thoughts. But she couldn’t. It was buried too deep to ever be banished by frustration. So, she gave up as she always did. She let it linger as she always did. She ignored it as she always did.

And then she turned up the heat.

It wasn’t a thoughtful gesture, just an action driven by self-loathing and instinct. Almost too hot became too hot. Not enough to burn became enough to burn.

Honestly, it’s a safety hazard that showers can even be this hot and she would certainly flag it up with Celine’s maintenance staff sometime in between checking off the various of boxes on her to do list.

Endless are the tasks of being head girl.

But she didn’t complain. She never did. Not when she was used inconsiderately to make up for the academy’s lack of staff. Not when her body, mind, heart and soul ached from the emotional, physical and spiritual fatigue that simply existing caused her.

There were times when Rumi had complaints about those unfavoured things.

Of course there were, she was human after all. Well, kind of.

Yet those complaints were never spoken.

They were silenced.

Burned.

That was the truest, main reason that she preferred her showers above the advised temperature. When things became too much, when woe and weariness overwhelmed her, when the mission she was supposed to complete felt too out of reach to keep going… she burned it all away.

The sadness, the doubt, the resentment. Every unfavoured feeling.

She set it all ablaze and let herself drown in the flames.

She could feel her pale skin growing tender and sore beneath the boil but still she turned it up.

Hotter. Steam consumed the cubicle and filled her lungs with thickness too heavy to breathe through. Hotter. Her scalp stung with sensitivity; her violet hair unravelled from her braid and frying against her back.

Hotter. Controlled and instinctive, she increased the already excessive heat even when it began hurting. “Good,” she thought dimly. She deserved to hurt.

Hotter. She deserved this agony that gnawed at her spirit like a greedy demon. Hotter. How dare she dream for love and freedom? She didn’t deserve that. Greedy demons like herself don’t deserve those luxuries.

Hotter. Hotter. Hotter. Too hot.

A soundless scream fled from her heaving lungs and liquid turmoil stung behind her pain widened eyes.

Taut with intense suffering in every sense of the word, her body strained and pressed against the wall as her nails sharpened into talons, gripping the moist tiles.

Angry, glowing rouge exploded across her patterns and replaced the ashamed, neutral indigo.

Sharply flicking her scorching wrist, Rumi turned the shower off and collapsed against the wall. The damp solidness held her in a way no one ever had. Pants drifted out her dry lips as her head spun like it had been flung into orbit. She couldn’t tell if her blurred vision was caused by the stubborn lingering of steam or the ache clenching her head.

Both, very likely both.

When the bathroom finally stopped whirring around her, she exited into her painfully bland bedroom and blindly found her towel. Awareness weaved through her mind in a dazed journey, but she eventually found herself in front of her neatly folded school uniform and dressed in complete silence.

A mirror stood beside her. She didn’t look at it.

She didn’t look at anything until her trousers were slipped on and her long-sleeved shirt was buttoned up. Even though she did her very best to ignore her lingering aching sadness and the red still thrumming through her hidden patterns, Rumi could feel the sting plaguing her puckered skin.

“Good,” the pain whispered. “You deserve this.”

She didn’t argue with that.

Now she was boiled, burned and drowned by flames, the smoke came. A smoke coating her senses that was so foggy it felt opaque. Somewhere in the daze of her smoky awareness, she ventured into the kitchen and found the meal she craved without even realizing.

Kimchi.

Notes:

I'm probably going to follow a 2 chapter per day routine so this should be completed fairly soon like around monday :3
feedback always welcome <3

Chapter 5: "Dumpling?"

Summary:

'If she was going to have to hide from these girls, she was going to have some fun with it.'

Notes:

might be the only update for today but I'm feeling pretty confident with this one or two chapter a day rhythm so expect more by tomorrow
giggling kicking my feet this was so fun to write lmfao i hope you enjoy it

Ever wondered if the universe is just a cruel bitch with a humour based only on irony? If you have, great job, you’re right. If you haven’t, you must be one of its favourites. Zoey Choi, on the other hand, is not one of its favourites.

For the last few years, sleep had been a fleeting friend and even when it visited, it was not restful.

Rest? Zoey hardly knew her.

Even when the days bleed into the nights, Zoey stays awake. Caught in a bout of doomscrolling or simply staring helplessly at the ceiling, she could never ease into a slumber.

Still, despite the common assumption of the opposite, she would always prefer the night from the day.

Every time she closed her bedroom door with the knowledge that she wouldn’t have to open it again until the morning, relief washed over her in a blissful wave. Finally, she could remove her mask of laughs that were too loud and smiles that were too wide and allow the looming negativity to take her.

Most people only knew Zoey through her heartwarming compliments, her bubbly personality and her endless trivia. Nothing other than the moon and the stars knew her through the sound of her tears muffled by a pillow or the sad lyrics she wrote when rap couldn’t accommodate the weariness of her soul.

When the sun fell from the sky and finished its nth shift at a job that never seemed to offer retirement, so did Zoey. She clocked out and lost her impeccable customer service to a sorrow that would most definitely have customers complaining to her manager about her lack of charisma.

Customers being every person who soaked up the warmth she radiated at her own expense and didn’t offer any in return.

Maybe that’s why she’s so drawn to Mira.

Each time they spar or butt heads, Zoey basks in the heat of the inferno that blazes so brilliantly within the other girl. She wouldn’t ever admit it, not even to herself, but deep down she knew that she didn’t hate Mira. Not one bit.

If anything, she admired her greatly.

Ever since the Kotadoski daughter performed in the dance competition she remembered so vividly, Zoey has been enamoured by the fire that seemed to burn through every inch of her being.

So, what if she fanned the flames a bit?

She knew that her nemesis enjoyed it as much as she did because of the wild gleam in her eyes when they go toe to toe. There was something explosive buried within Mira. All Zoey did was ignite her. It’s what good rivals do. Rivals, nothing more. But certainly nothing less. Even though the rapper hadn’t allowed herself to ponder affection over their feud, she truly does hope that she’s her favourite challenge. Mira is certainly hers.

On the generous occasion where sleep comes for Zoey, she usually dreams of fights that feel like freestyle dance and an opponent with tresses of beautiful crimson. However, when that opponent was currently lay right beside her, her subconscious decided to make things more interesting.

And by interesting – absolutely fucking brutal.

You were warned, the universe is a smug sadist, and Zoey is a lamb to slaughter.

The nightmare began slowly. She was back in middle school, the halls were eerily quiet, and each classroom was empty. She moved with caution and felt like she was being followed by something other than her shadow.

Then she found herself in front of her locker. It’s been years and the lockers were all the same obnoxious shade of red, but she knew so easily that this was hers.

FAGGOT.

Each letter written with sharp edges intended to pierce her heart and make her bleed liquid sorrow through her eyes. Sharpie didn’t care for the insistent rubs of her palms or the saliva added in a desperate attempt. It was permanent. The marker and the damage it had on Zoey.

Falling to her knees, head pressing against the tainted metal, the tears poured messy and relentless. Her chest heaved. Her shoulders slumped and shook violently. Her breath ran ragged like a mad dog on a hunt. Through blurred vision, Zoey looked down at her trembling hands to see that they were small.

So small.

And she knew who she was again. She knew what suppressed trauma had crawled out of the cage she trapped it in and took her in the night. She knew what she would see when she turned her head, but it still made her howl with a guttural screech.

Her limited-edition Sunlight Sister’s magazine, signed by all three retired idols and bought from an international seller with a money she earned herself, reduced to a tattered mess. Running her fingers through the pile of her ripped hopes and dreams, she cradled the remnants as if she could salvage it, but the paper only became damp; soaked by her tears.

Laughs bounced off the wall without seeming to have any source or purposeful direction, the fluorescent lights lining the ceiling flickered rapidly until they burst with sparking crackles but most deafening of all was the bell.

Any noise Zoey made was effortlessly swallowed by the chaos storming around her, but she still opened her mouth and screamed so brutally that the Honmoon would have shattered pathetically if this weren’t a just a nightmare.

Wakefulness snatched Zoey from the grasps of this sleeping dystopia and thrust her back into the land of the living. Her eyes flew open as she woke in a cold sweat, her body taut with quivers as her heart raced. “Just a nightmare,” she thought in faux indifference. “Nothing but a dream.”

Cornering that suppressed trauma back into its cage, Zoey forced herself to relax and took slow albeit shaky breaths until her pulse felt steady again.

A hollow laugh trembled Zoey’s recovering body as she couldn’t believe how genuinely twisted it was that she finally got to sleep only experience the worst nightmare of her life. “Fucking hell, I am never complaining about insomnia again,” she thought lazily and buried her face into the stuffed toy held tightly in her arms, grounding herself.

But wait… why did said stuffed toy feel so much firmer than usual? Why did it smell like rose, leather and incense? Why did the soft fur feel like silky human hair? Why was that hair…pink?

OH FUCK NO.

Any lingering sleep fled from Zoey like the ground during an earthquake as she was plunged into the cold seas of horror. Energized by utter mortification, she jolted into a sitting position and so did the ‘stuffed toy’.

Zoey’s eyes widened. Mira’s eyes widened. Zoey screamed. Mira screamed. Zoey screamed. Mira screamed. (Yeah, this went on for a while.)

Eventually they untangled their intertwined limbs and scrambled away from each other, Mira promptly fell off the bed with a dull thud while the door was already slamming against the wall, flung open by Zoey who ran like the room was on fire.

───  ⋅ ∙ ∘ ☽ ༓ ☾ ∘ ⋅ ⋅  ───

“Too many damn stairs!” Zoey hissed to herself as she descended the third flight with a flushed face and minimal oxygen intake.

After years of training in both breakdancing and hunting, she has impeccable stamina but simply waking up had put her heart into cardio.

Her legs wrapped around Mira’s waist, her arms circling Mira’s torso, her faced buried between Mira’s neck and shoulder. Mira, Mira, Mira!

That damn pink haired she-devil intruded her brain and conquered it arrogantly. Any coherent thought Zoey formed was about the softness of her rival’s skin and the silkiness of her hair which only worsened her spiral. Rooms, hallways, windows and so many damn stairs passed in a whir of muted colours and dated décor until Zoey’s brain decided there was finally enough space between her and she who shall not be named.

But of course, she was named.

‘Mira’ echoed through her brain until her cheeks were as flushed as her stupidly perfect hair. Holding her knees, which were uncovered due to her blue pyjama shorts, and hanging her head, she groaned lowly in mental overwhelm while trying to figure out what the fuck just happened.

Most certainly, she would never knowingly hug Mira; they had never even high fived! (The singular time Zoey offered, Mira had simply eyed her shorter height then smirked ‘You mean low five?’).

Zoey knew there had to be a logical explanation for this and after ruling out the wildest of ideas that ranged from ‘I have an evil gay twin that takes over my body when I sleep’ to ‘I was sleep wrestling because I hate her so much and it only looked like cuddling’, she finally narrowed it down to two possibilities:

A) Truthfully, she does always hug a stuffed toy or a pillow while she sleeps. Her subconscious body just behaved on instinct, mistaking Mira for her usual intimate sleep companions.

B) During she nightmare, she had reached for the nearest safe thing which had been Mira because deep down, she finds comfort in her supposed enemy’s presence.

Not even allowing herself to consider the latter, Zoey forced out a hollow laugh and shook her head. It’s not a big deal. Really and truly, it wasn’t.

People do so many weird things when they sleep – she would know after going through a phase of sleepwalking when she first moved to Korea. Accidentally cuddling her arch nemesis because they were forced to share a bed together really wasn’t high on the scale of strangeness.

It was just a silly mistake. Zoey wasn’t affected. They had both screamed because it was simply an unexpected situation to wake up to, especially when she had endured the worst nightmare of her life.

(So why did she still feel the ghost of Mira’s arm around her shoulders? Why did she mourn the contact?)

───  ⋅ ∙ ∘ ☽ ༓ ☾ ∘ ⋅ ⋅  ───

Shoving all overwhelming thoughts to the back of her brain, Zoey took a deep breath and observed her new surroundings. The bottom floor of Celine’s large manor with an excessive number of stairs. The lounge, sleek and modest, was to her left. The front door was to her right. The kitchen was in front of her. And oh, so was Rumi.

Wait. What?

Blinking dumbly, Zoey slowly turned her scanning head back towards the kitchen and recognized the unforgettable sight of the student council leader who had made such an impact with just a nod. As if it were a part of her avatar, Rumi’s modest yet torturously well fitted uniform clung to her broad figure and all the harmonious curves.

Zoey stood there in complete silence, half hoping that maybe Rumi wouldn’t see her if she stayed entirely still. However, Rumi was already looking at her, eyes unreadable as she stood leaned against the counter with a bowl of kimchi.

The microwave dinged, echoing in the silence. Like a cowboy during a standoff, Rumi slowly opened the small door and held out a plate of steaming pastries. “Dumpling?”

Zoey didn’t know to laugh, cry or simply faint.

Ever the wild card, she decided on screaming.

A horrified shriek left her and didn’t relent as she raced back up the stairs without a singular complaint. “Holy fuck, holy fuck, holy fuck!” She repeated like all knowledge had been stripped from her brain and was left with only two words. Before long, Zoey reached her room with the intent to hide under the covers until it was safe to come out.

Lost in the chaos, she completely forgot the morning’s earlier incident or even the fact that she unfortunately had a roommate therefore, she didn’t knock. In consequence, she flung open the door to a very half naked Mira.

Having recovered enough to stand from the floor, Mira had began dressing for the school day and now stood in nothing but tights, a skirt and a navy-coloured bra while feeling extremely exposed.

Zoey’s eyes widened. Mira’s eyes widened. Zoey screamed. Mira screamed. Zoey screamed. Mira screamed. (Yeah, this went on for a while, again.)

Instead of running away again, Zoey spluttered out an incoherent jumble of Korean and English which Mira managed to decipher as ‘Downstairs! Rumi! Dumplings!’ and before she could ask what the fuck any of that meant, she was dragged out the room and down multiple flights of stairs.

Although she was still half dressed, Mira’s focus was only on that even though she had reacted so fearfully, she couldn’t help thinking the cuddling wasn’t too bad. Thankfully, that uncomfortable focus was shifted to the current chaos by a panicked stammer from the girl who clutched her hand like a lifeline.

“Oh god Mira what if all the dirty looks you gave her yesterday made her mad and she broke in to get revenge?” Zoey wailed in distress while Mira scoffed. “Don’t be stupid, that isn’t happening.” She scorned exasperatedly but couldn’t help gulping. “Probably.”

Eventually reaching the bottom floor, Mira and Zoey crept up to the wall separating the kitchen from the staircase before peaking around it. Unsurprisingly, their usually excellent stealth was reduced to flustered fear and Rumi easily spotted them.

As if this were her regular Tuesday morning, the breakfasting girl blinked at them thoughtfully a few times before offering out the plate beside her. “Dumpling?”

“I think they’re poisonous. Don’t fall for it, Mira!” Zoey hissed ever so loudly to Mira who nodded vehemently.

Suddenly an unfamiliar chuckle floated through the air melodically as both girls slowly turned with the fluidity of a rusted animatronic to look at Rumi who was robbed of her infuriating indifference by an amused twinkle in her eyes. The sun shining through the windows highlighted the glossiness of her braided purple hair and the tension of her button up shirt over distinct muscle. They both gulped.

Mira’s dream came back to her with the inconvenience of a mosquito, filling her mind with fantastical images of what lay beneath Rumi’s uniform and a different direction this constant intensity with Zoey could go.

Suppressing the thoughts like they personally offended her, Mira cleared her throat weakly, trying to assert some control over the situation despite the fact she was still in her bra and leaned impossibly close to Zoey as they peered at Rumi.

Setting down her breakfast with practiced ease, Rumi approached them calmly as she tilted her head calmly. “Ah, you two are the new students! I briefly met you yesterday with Mr Kim.” She nodded in recognition, her lips curling with something akin to friendliness as if that interaction hadn’t scarred Mira and Zoey for life.

Taking their speechlessness as a chance to continue, she paused and effortlessly imitated a thoughtful expression despite being more than aware what was going on.

Of course, she realized that these girls were the troublesome junior hunters that Celine warned her about, but her mentor had told her that polite cluelessness would be the best disguise for her demonic identity.

Maybe she did she mildly favoured the flushed expressions contorting their faces, is that a crime? If she was going to have to hide from these girls, she was going to have some fun with it. “So, what are you doing in my house?”

Finally gaining some composure, Mira straightened her posture and frowned, her current bareness forgotten. “Your house?” She asked suspiciously while Zoey simply gawked at Rumi like she was her celebrity crush and her biggest threat.

“She didn’t tell you? Well, Celine is my…” (“dead mother’s ex situationship”) “parental guardian. I’ve lived with here all my life.”

  ───  ⋅ ∙ ∘ ☽ ༓ ☾ ∘ ⋅ ⋅  ───

Excusing herself with student council duties, Rumi left for school with the insufferable indifference of someone so subtly smug with themselves while Mira, now fully dressed and returned to her usual storminess, cursed her name like a sailor and Zoey agreed despite her flushed face.

The ‘accidentally cuddling my rival during a nightmare’ incident and the ‘also accidentally walking in on that rival while she was changing and gawking at her stupid perfect body’ incident lingered in the back of her mind like a rash but thankfully, neither mishap were brought up while they readied for the day ahead.

“Right, forget about that smug prick,” Mira announced, half talking to herself. “We have a mission to complete and a demon to identify.”

Nodding vehemently, Zoey walked out of Celine’s property beside her fellow trainee, accidental cuddle buddy and sworn enemy. “Pfft I wouldn’t be surprised if it was Rumi.”

Surprisingly, Mira snickered and spared her an amused glance that didn’t contain any of the usual scorn. “Me neither.”

Something softened in her voice as her stomach fluttered with an unfamiliar but honestly not unpleasant feeling as she continued. “Don’t get me wrong, you are still the most insufferable dork on this planet, but for the sake of this mission, how about a truce?”

Torn between mocking her sudden softness and absolutely melting into a puddle, Zoey settled for a small smile as she nodded slowly. “Yeah,” she agreed with a newfound lightness to her tone before adding with a tinge of bashfulness, “Only for the mission, obviously.”

A beat passed. Then two.

“Rumi is hot though, isn’t she?”

Mira responded with a low groan of tortured agreement. “Painfully so.”

───  ⋅ ∙ ∘ ☽ ༓ ☾ ∘ ⋅ ⋅  ───

Meanwhile, Rumi sneezed several times with utter bafflement during a pleasant chat with Bobby who patted her back sympathetically and offered her tissues.

Also meanwhile, Celine was lay in her bed with the stiffness of a frozen corpse while she thanked her ancestors, the Honmoon and her lucky stars for the fact Rumi hadn’t noticed the hickeys littered across her neck beneath her black waves of hair.

Despite hearing the screams and repetitive use of stairs, Celine had been too shaken to do anything but hope Rumi had a handle on whatever was happening.

Now, still haunted by the events of last night, she reluctantly risked a glance to her right, only to flush an unhealthy shade of red when she was blessed or cursed by the smug smile of very naked Lisa Jeong.

Celine looked back up at the ceiling and sighed in utter exasperation despite the flutter of her heart.

“Ancestors help me.”

Notes:

I am having too much fun with Lisa's character, there's so much about her that i just can't tell you yet so we're just going to stick with her flustering Celine, kay? 😇
pretty please with a cherry on top comment any feedback (´▽`ʃ♡ƪ)

Chapter 6: Only human after all (Well, sort of.)

Summary:

'Despite being suspicious from the start, she only now realized that she’d been wishing to be wrong.'

Notes:

Imagine Oh from Home and Baymax from Big Hero 6 were merged into a stupidly hot demon in hiding. That is Rumi.

There are three references in this chapter. 1 is a musical, 2 and 3 are tiktok sounds. lmk if you spot them!

Food shovelled into mouths with no patience or manners. Conversations spoken well above an inside voice. Rumours spreading through the canteen like a cancer. This ain’t no highschool, this is the Thunderdome.

Like cockroaches set loose, Zoey’s skin crawled as the supressed memories of elementary reared their ugly heads. Unbeknownst to her family, she hadn’t been in a public school since she moved to Korea thanks to her enrolment at ‘Generational Innovation’. Sure, she did basic academics throughout training, but most of her time was spent preparing mentally and physically to fight demons.

Now, here she was, disguised as a normal sophomore and she hated every second of it.

Fortunately, Zoey hadn’t faced any bullies yet, but the threat felt constant. Anytime anyone looked at her, she braced for a scathing remark. A few insufferable peers murmured judgment whenever she was close, and one had even gone as far as to snatch her frog bucket hat off her face. However, to everyone’s surprise, it had promptly returned it when Mira appeared, glowering with something shockingly close to protectiveness.

When Mira proposed a truce, Zoey had accepted with caution but as the days passed, she started thinking that maybe this wasn’t only for the mission. Maybe being forced to collaborate had unlocked something hidden and soft within Mira. And no matter how much she denied herself, she couldn’t help but find it nice.

Over time, Zoey began noticing the little things about herself and Mira.

The way Celine provided them with separate rooms, and she almost felt disappointed when she didn’t wake up cuddling Mira again. The way Mira rolled her eyes every time she geeked out but still listened with something akin to fondness curling her lips slightly. The way she finally followed Mira on social media, and her friend request had been accepted immediately. They way Mira never sent her anything and complained about the spamming but still responded to every single video with some form of feedback.

They way years of contempt and rivalry vanished the first time Mira laughed at one of her stupid jokes instead of scorning her. The way all her thoughts were tinged with pink. The way-

“Hello? Anyone in there?” a tapping sensation brought Zoey out of her overwhelming situations as she blinked a few times to see Mira blatantly prodding her finger into her forehead across the lunch table. “Earth to Zoey?”

Jolting as if she’d been electrocuted, Zoey leaned back and batted Mira’s hand away with little force as the other girl simply laughed amusedly.

“You proper spaced out.” She hummed slowly and Zoey tried not to think about the way Mira had started using her vocab subconsciously. Zoey failed. “Are you alright?”

The genuine concern masked by casual interest in Mira’s tone paused the overwhelm in Zoey’s brain as she couldn’t help a small smile creasing her cheeks. “Yeah, I’m fine.” Mira tried not to think about the flutter her heart gave when the dimple appeared on Zoey’s cheek. Mira failed. “Just thinking.”

“About?” Mira prompted, tilting her head slowly in the way she always did when she listened.

Unwilling to admit how all her recent thoughts blended into a mental mosaic of her supposed enemy’s insufferably pretty face that didn’t seem so insufferable anymore, Zoey dug through the depths of her brain for an excuse before purple coloured her awareness and the name slipped from her lips as soon as it registered in her mind.

“Rumi.”

Trying not to cringe under the surprised raise if Mira’s eyebrow, Zoey recovered quickly. “It’s just weird. We’ve barely seen her around the house despite the fact she literally lives there, and even at school, she always seems to avoid us as much as possible without it seeming blatant.”

 

Thankfully, Mira nodded along as her brows creased thoughtfully. “You’re right,” Zoey tried not to glow under the agreement. “It is rather weird. She acts so polite, but it just seems… calculated in a way. Like every interaction is planned for a bigger picture that we’re not being allowed to see. Nothing she does seems casual.”

Genuinely thinking now, Zoey listened intently then scanned the canteen for any signs of purple and confirmed there was none before she continued in a lower voice. “You don’t think she could be…you know?” Equally amused and bemused, Mira responded dryly. “Queer? I hope so.”

Basking in the warmth of the humorous snort she won from Zoey, she shrugged her shoulders with a suppressed smile. “I don’t know Zo; we can’t really label her as a demon for being emotionally constipated and stupidly hot.”

Understanding the point, Zoey murmured agreement while picking at her dumpling, trying and failing not to think about how cute Rumi’s offer had been. “Yeah, she is stupidly hot.” Relating to the grumpiness clouding Zoey’s expression, Mira sighed as her shoulders dropped.

“I know it’s only been a few days, but this mission just seems impossible now. How are we going to identify a demon anomaly if we don’t even understand said anomaly?” Plopping the dumpling into her mouth and chewing around it lazily, Zoey added. “Exactly and the Honmoon feels so muted around here, like its muffled by something. I guess that’s the odd behaviour GI picked up on but that means fuck all when we have no clue who or what that something is.”

Before she could tease the usually bubbly girl for her profanity, Mira’s attention shifted to the near distance where she could see a certain purple haired girl walking past the canteen. Following her fellow trainee’s eyeline, Zoey also noticed Rumi and raised her eyebrows. “You know, I haven’t seen her eat in here once? Like what does she even have for lunch?” Endlessly exasperated by the mystery surrounding this girl, Mira huffed.

“Souls, probably.”

And then, Rumi stopped. Her unwavering steady pace ended abruptly. Zoey and Mira froze instantly, stiffened by surprise. Next, Rumi turned. Breath caught in the girls’ throats when brown eyes immediately found them through the sea of students filling the canteen. They barely registered her travel to the nearest door and the next thing they knew was the gut emptying sight of Rumi approaching them, weaving between tables with alarming purpose.

“There’s no way she heard us.” Zoey and Mira chorused in hushed tones.

But yes. There was a way.

───  ⋅ ∙ ∘ ☽ ༓ ☾ ∘ ⋅ ⋅  ───

Both a strength and a weakness, one of the many hidden side effects of being half demon was inhumanly high senses.

Rumi didn’t know why she was doing this. It wasn’t uncommon for her peers to theorize her unwavering social distance but hearing the comments of these girls specifically struck a nerve for reasons that she wasn’t ready to unpack.

Yes, Celine had strictly warned her to not engage with the junior hunter’s unless it was necessary, but she had enough sense to know polite cluelessness would only get her so far.

So, here she was, determined to seem normal and friendly. It wasn’t going very well.

“I am having lunch with you.” Each syllable sounded punctuated, and she stood at the foot of the table like she had been programmed. Maybe growing up with Celine had hindered her social skills more than she realized but she refused to give up. Clearing her throat and spreading her lips with her best attempts of a smile, she added. “Please?”

Silence followed her request as the girls stared up at her in equal parts awe and horror. “Her face is so pretty, and I want to fucking punch it.” Mira thought with aggressive attraction while Zoey was tempted to pinch her cheeks and squeal at how adorably incompetent the usually unreadable girl seemed.

Instead, they opted for a casual nod. “Okay.”

Rumi couldn’t help the giddy feeling fluttering her heart as she sat at the nearest empty chair and scooted closer. Nobody spoke for a few moments, but Rumi hadn’t yet learned the concept of an awkward silence, so she filled it with the first observation that came to mind.

“You have dumplings.”

It took Zoey impossibly long to even comprehend that the words were directed at her before she nodded slowly, glancing down at the plate in front of her. “Oh, yeah, I do. Do you uhm want one?” Rumi almost declined the offer as she only needed a meal a day to the slow metabolism that her demon side gave her, but she decided that wasn’t very normal human girl of her, so she instead nodded with too much enthusiasm.

Never one to withhold her opinions, Mira rolled her eyes and scoffed. “You and these fucking dumplings.” Surprised by the comment, Rumi looked at her with an earnest expression that made Mira want to coo and she did not like that want at all, so she simply stared back unhelpfully.

Kicking Mira sharply under the table, Zoey sent her a sharp glare before explaining apologetically. She knew that Mira hadn’t meant anything too unkind, but Rumi didn’t seem like the type of person to understand that. “What Mira means is that you seem to have dumplings an awful lot. Is there a reason for that?”

The question caught Rumi off guard. She hadn’t prepared for this. No one ever asked her such unnecessary questions well… ever. Her peers had long lost interest in her except from student council business and Celine never talked to her about such trivial things as her food preferences.

Forced to think deeply for a moment, something soft and unfamiliar to everyone including herself took over as she spoke slowly. “My mother.” She responded with a quietness that felt too real for all the secrets and lies she lived with. “It was her favourite food apparently.”

Rumi couldn’t help the bashful tinge to her cheeks as she looked down at the dumpling in her hand like it was precious. “I started eating them when I was younger on the days that felt particularly hard without her, and I guess it just became instinctive.”

It was the first time she thought about her mother without a lump in her throat or shame weighing on her shoulders.

The lightness of her self-discovery relaxed the stiffness of her behaviour so loosely that she might’ve revealed the truth if she was questioned about who her mother was but thankfully, she wasn’t pressed because frankly the undercover junior hunters beside her were too close to tears to investigate.

Swallowing the lump in her throat, Mira responded hoarsely. “That’s quite sweet.” Despite her attempts, her voice was robbed of all its usual guarded indifference, and she was left with something unfamiliar blooming in her heart. On the other hand, Zoey was doing everything in her power not to blubber hysterically while her vision blurred with liquid empath.

Damn this stupidly hot emotionally constipated girl for being so adorable and sad with her endearing awkwardness.

“Oi, American!”

The yell shattered the fragile silence filled with the beginnings of something favourable and made all three girls jump. A boy, specifically the one who had previously snatched Zoey’s hat, stood at the opposite end of the long table with his gaggle of mindless jocks.

Reduced to a blur of red, the apple launched through the air and seemed to replicate the asteroid that took out the dinosaurs as it flew towards a very unprepared Zoey who braced for impact, accepting her fate as soon as she realized what was happening. Shockingly, that fate was rejected on her behalf.

Slowly opening her clenched eyes one at a time, Zoey was met with the sight of Rumi’s hand hovering above her face, apple cradled in her grip. She stared wide eyed at Mira whose expression replicated her own bewilderment, they both turned to Rumi.

Lost in her foreign relaxation, Rumi had forgotten that no human could possibly have reacted so quickly as she thoughtfully examined the apple, tilting her head earnestly before she bit into it and munched contently. Then, speaking with a full mouth because she remembered that was something normal people do all too well, she mused lightly.

“That was an impressive throw, he could make a good pitcher.”

───  ⋅ ∙ ∘ ☽ ༓ ☾ ∘ ⋅ ⋅  ───

[Two weeks after the canteen.]

Metal scraping against metal. Steam heating the air to a scented cloud of humidity. Boiled water bubbling within pans like a jacuzzi for groceries. Thirty students blindly following the recipe without a hint of understanding.

Most people would find the atmosphere unbearably overwhelming, spiralling in the chaos of the kitchen.

Mira, however, was almost lulled to sleep by the noise.

Standing at her assigned seat with ingredients and utensils, she moved through the motions of cooking as if it were just another one of her choreographed dances. The teacher, a tired woman that she didn’t bother to learn the name of, had given them rigid instructions on how to prepare this dish. Mira promptly decided that was bullshit and simply used her vast knowledge to do it her own way. Twenty minutes in and she had forgotten all about the reason she was even here.

Cooking is the closest thing she’s ever had to therapy.

During her childhood, her parents would disappear with their brother on business they dryly explained was none of hers and she was left to the ‘care’ of their neglectful staff.

Eventually, like a rare gift from God, Cindy came. She was patient and warm in the way that a homecooked meal is.

After spotting 12-year-old Mira spy on her while she cooked, she offered her lessons and the standoffish child accepted with stubbornly veiled enthusiasm. With foreign kindness and honest praise, Cindy taught her the basics, and the kitchen became a safe space. The straightforwardness of methods paired with endless variety made Mira feel in control and free at the same time.

Because all good things must come to an end despite how little good things she received, her parents let Cindy go which left Mira with nothing but all the places in the kitchen where she used to be and wasn’t anymore. Since she truly was angelic, the fired cook gifted Mira a hug that didn’t let go until she did and a professional set of knives.

Years of accidentally cut knuckles and burned meals passed by in a blur until she became quite the talent. Of course, her parents didn’t know because firstly, they didn’t know anything about her other than their propaganda and secondly, any meal Mira cooked for them would likely be coated in poison.

Even after training as a junior hunter for so long, she still clung onto the comfort cooking gave her like the last sanctuary in a tsunami.

Memories of Cindy and their limited time together soothed the fire constantly burning within Mira until they were tamed flames only intending to roast vegetables.

Then she heard this agitating, grading voice.

“Mira,” her name was whined in a tone that could only be described as helplessly pathetic. “I’ve done it wrong.”

Pulled out of her peace like a last straw, Mira slowly turned to face the girl beside her. Zoey, who was in fact spiralling in the chaos of the kitchen, pointed at the charred mess in her pan like it was anyone’s fault but her own. A scathing remark slid onto Mira’s tongue before she was silenced by her own internal monologue.

“You are the one who offered a truce.” The angel on her right reminded her pointedly. How dare her own words be used against her by herself. “Be nice.” Reluctantly, she swallowed back any automatic insult and paused thoughtfully to find something nice to say. “It really takes you that long?”

 Huffing exasperatedly, Mira rolled her eyes and forced a thin-lipped smile and spoke with the softest voice possible. “It’s okay, I’ll help.”

Zoey stared at the taller girl like she had grown three heads but moved aside all the same but not without playfully shoving her shoulder, amused by her rival’s newfound self-restraint. Strangling the angel on her shoulder and throwing it far away, Mira turned instantly with a glower that could kill which only made Zoey giggle.

It wasn’t long until they erupted into a familiar push and shove filled with thinly veiled joy and a stifled laughter. Neither would admit how much they enjoyed the other’s banter.

And once again, because no good things can last, Zoey’s scorched food that Mira had been attempting to salvage was accidentally knocked right out of her hands. Bracing for the clatter of the dish’s descent and a scold from their teacher, Mira and Zoey stiffened but the noise never came.

The pan hadn’t hit the floor.

Slowly opening their clenched eyes, the girls found it cradled in the steady grip of non-other than, you guessed it, student council leader, Rumi.

“Hm, I think this is a bit burned.” She mused unhelpfully, tilting her head with polite distaste at the miserable attempt at cooking. After not receiving a response, she looked up to see two pairs of mortified eyes.

Oh, yes. Normal human girls would find this excruciating.

Slowly setting the pan down, Rumi paused before mustering her most convincing. “Ow.” Trying her best to act out what she assumed would be an appropriate reaction, she looked down at her miraculously unscathed hands, palms only flushed pink, before excusing herself. “I’ll go see Nurse Jeong.”

Left with open mouths and buffering brains, Mira and Zoey watched her go before turning slowly to each other. Zoey spoke first, “Mira… I was only joking before but what if she is…” She didn’t need to finish her hesitant suggestion for Mira to nod along. “We still need more reasons for valid investigation but… we’ll keep an eye out.”

Yanked out of her deep thoughts by the jarring sound of a fire alarm, Mira whipped around to see her neglected dish burst into flames as she frantically maintained it while Zoey doubled over laughing.

The hunting division’s best trainees, ladies and gentlemen.

───  ⋅ ∙ ∘ ☽ ༓ ☾ ∘ ⋅ ⋅  ───

[Three weeks after cooking]

Tick. Tick. Tick.

The seconds passed as they always did but it felt like hours dragged between each one. Reading off the board with the enthusiasm of an introvert in theatre, the teacher – Mr Lee, notorious for his monotonous voice and dull personality – droned on about the current topic.

Legends and their relevance to current media.

Despite her intelligence, if you asked Mira what she was learning about she’d probably say arithmetic or biology while Zoey had her head in her hands, too disinterested to even doodle a turtle. Yes, the lesson is just that boring. Most of the pupils shared these sentiments; worksheets unfinished, eyes lifeless and brains numb with tedium.

On the other hand, surprising to no one, Rumi had already completed several worksheets and was currently writing down extra notes.

Don’t misunderstand, she also found this lesson impossibly dull, she’s only human after all. (Well, sort of.)

But her instincts won’t allow anything less than exceptional. After growing up under the weight of fulfilling a century’s long duty to simply be worthy of life, she developed the inescapable need to be the best to be enough.

Everyone else got Bs and Cs? Rumi is receiving nothing but an A+. Everyone else late on their homework? Rumi is earning extra credits. Everyone else is lagging during sports day? Rumi is already on her third lap. The junior hunters are practicing their cardio? Rumi is running ultramarathons in substitution for an evening jog.

And after all that, she will still cover the mirror with a towel and burn in the shower because that’s what she deserves. She will still wake up every morning with the belief that she didn’t deserve to and must be brilliant to earn it.

Blinded by desperation to keep a promise, Celine hadn’t considered the fragility of children when she taught Rumi that the Honmoon needs to be turned golden before she can be free, that her skin needs to be bare of all its shameful markings before it can be seen.

Despite her rigid and often harmful attempt at parenting, Celine really does love Rumi.

She truly loves her as much as her broken heart can love anyone. Unfortunately for everyone involved, that just isn’t enough. Especially not when it’s paired with her teachings based on all the hate that she’s learned.

Conflicted by prejudice and care, Celine accepted the things she understood and rejected the things she didn’t until Rumi rejected herself too. Any association to her demonic heritage felt like a bullseye of shame. That’s why she winced whenever she caught sight of the hidden patterns writhing around her body or flinched whenever anything satanic was mentioned.

“Now, we move onto demons. Demons are a large part of our culture’s tales and have remained relevant through popular media such as K-Drama.”

The flinch jolted Rumi out of her self-loathing determination so violently that her pen fell victim an effortless snap, breaking into jagged halves in her hand. Thankfully, everyone had been mildly intrigued by the mention of K-Dramas and were too distracted to notice the mishap.

However, the relief didn’t last long.

“A common depiction of demons is,” Mr Lee paused to gesture to the new PowerPoint slide projected onto the wall. “This.”

Several curved horns, pairs of jagged wings, vivid red skin taut over exaggerated muscles.

The inaccuracy was basically offensive.

Rumi couldn’t help herself. And by the sound of it, neither could Mira and Zoey.

“Demons don’t look like that.”

A beat passed. Then two.

All three girls slowly turned to look at each other across the classroom. Mira and Zoey stared at Rumi. Rumi stared back. Excusing the students who exited with blatant eagerness, the bell rang, announcing the start of lunch. None of them moved for too long.

For the first time in weeks, Rumi didn’t join Mira and Zoey for an amusingly awkward meal. Instead, she exited briskly, beelining for the nearest locker room – desperate to wash away the shame and panic coursing through her veins and overwhelming her head.

Eventually, the junior hunters sat at their usual spot in the canteen and ate in silence. As if it were inevitable, Mira sighed as she clicked her communication device disguised as a silver wristwatch and spoke into it.

“We’ve found the demon.”

Despite being suspicious from the start, she only now realized that she’d been wishing to be wrong. Unwillingly, her eyes lingered on the empty seat beside her.

Meanwhile, desperate to fill the sudden pit in her stomach, Zoey ate her food quietly.

Although, her dumplings remained untouched.

Notes:

Guys can you follow my tumblr pretty please? I've decided to lock in- expect fanart and poems and whatever about my fics
The link is https://www.tumblr.com/theohdeerarchives?source=share
Also, please comment any feedback
(´▽`ʃ♡ƪ)

Chapter 7: Space for anything to happen next

Summary:

I can't possibly summarise any of this. just read it and get back to me

Notes:

don't ask me what happened, i have no clue<
Gonna take a break from longer fics and use some writing prompts - probably lots of fluff and bittersweet angst
however i will continue this series at some point with a roadtrip, finding Rumi fic then a college fic

“This is completely unnecessary.” Celine’s words were harsh although they masked a mess of dread and panic. “I allow you to investigate my school, provide accommodation for your people and you repay me by accusing the child under my care of being a demon? It’s ludicrous, Min Ju, completely ludicrous!”

Boiling with bitterness and a grudge, Min Ju grabbed Celine’s hand and dragged her away from the current commotion before turning with a glare that could kill if it wasn’t matched by the other woman.

“Cut the bullshit,” she demanded with words so scathing that it was more hiss than speech. “That ‘child’ of yours has a demon father. The only reason it wasn’t taken in is the council’s unwise decision but with this new suspicion, you can’t protect it anymore.”

“She is not a child of mine.” Celine bit back, tone laced with venom that hid the tremor in her words.

The tension dipped for a moment, like a strained string eased seconds before snapping point. Cold shock contorted the fury on Min Ju’s face into something buried and delicate, the shattered pieces of who she once was and who she lots reflected by the tears glazing over her one-eyed gaze before it narrowed aggressively.

“Don’t you dare pull that card.” Her entire body quivered with equal parts grief and fury that mixed to make something ever so lethal. “Don’t you fucking do that, Celine. You aren’t allowed to so don’t fucking do it.”

But still, Celine didn’t back down. She didn’t waver or retreat.

Instead, she leant closer.

Now her head leering in front of the older woman’s so threateningly that the nearby crowd of Hunters wondered if she was about to breathe fire.

“Lie to yourself all you want; it doesn’t change the fact that Rumi is her daughter. Her dying wish was to make sure that her girl was loved. Are you doing that, Min Ju? Are you honouring that wish?”

Breath stuttering, tears pooling, Celine’s anger faltered into desperation.

“You used to be so much like her, her Mini Mimi. Now… now I don’t even know who you are. And if she were here, I don’t think Mi-Yeong would either.”

THWACK

Skin on skin meeting in a thunderclap of contact echoed through Celine’s property as everyone froze, stiffened by disbelief.

Choking on the tears lumping in her throat and pouring down her face, Mi-Yeong’s bitterness gave way to burning rage paired with a gaping pit of emotional agony.

“Well, she isn’t here, Celine.” Gone was the hollow, revenge driven woman and here was the girl in her late teens who never grew past her grief. Yells turned to wails, scowls turned to sobs, Min-Ju bawled helplessly. “Mi-yeong isn’t here. She left us. She isn’t here anymore. She left me. My unnie is gone.”

Arms wrapped around shuddering shoulders. A chin rested on top of the crying face tucked into a neck.

Cheek still red from impact, Celine pulled Min-Ju into a hug that was more desperation than comfort. The lost pieces of her heart came back and ached so terribly that her chest hurt but she didn’t let the emotional pain wracking her body waver the grip of her embrace.

“I know she’s gone.” The words were almost silly to say aloud as a day hasn’t gone by when Celine didn’t feel Mi-Yeong’s absence. “But you still have me, I swear you do. You still have an unnie in me, okay? Please, know that. You never stopped being my little sister. I just couldn’t let you break my promise. I refuse to break it even though she’s gone.”

Triggered like a loose cannon, the fury of Min Ju’s grief reared its ugly head. “Mi-Yeong is gone… and it’s that bastard demon’s fault. So, I’m going to make it pay.” Taut with unfiltered rage and contempt, she pulled back and moved before anyone could react. “Even if it means going through you.”

Sunken into unprepared skin, the unforgiving binyeo hairpin tore through a carotid on the side of Celine’s neck. She didn’t have time to let go of the hug. Her eyes widened as she slumped against Min Ju who let her drop.

───  ⋅ ∙ ∘ ☽ ༓ ☾ ∘ ⋅ ⋅  ───

“NO.”

Everything silenced at the roar. Everything stilled in fear of being the next target. Everything unravelled when Rumi burst from grip of several hunters with alarming ease.

All focus was on her rage, her red-hot steaming rage that had been dormant for all her life but now erupted with the intent to take casualties.

Her nostrils felt like fumaroles; her throat felt like lava was flowing through it violently and her palms stung like she had scraped them against sandpaper.

Her chest heaving excessively as breathing had become a battle that she was losing, Rumi stared wide-eyed at Celine lay crumpled on the floor with equal amounts horror and rage that sent shivers down the spines of everyone present.

Stalking forwards with staggered steps, Rumi transformed into something that she’d spent her whole life trying not to become.

Demonic indigo shone blatantly through the cover of Rumi’s pyjamas – clothes far to soft for the sharp intensity of this moment. Sparking flames unravelled her dragon braid into a mess that cascaded down her back in a waterfall of violet. Horns clawed out of her forehead like the crooked teeth of a monster.

“I knew I was right about you.” Min Ju sneered violently, almost seeming as demonic as Rumi. “It was only a matter of time before you revealed yourself.”

Clawing her hand through the Honmoon’s shimmering strings, Min Ju reached for her weapon. It didn’t come. A wave of bewilderment crashed into the retired idol as if cold water had been poured over her head as all her attempts to summon her blade failed almost comically.

“No, no, no!”

Terror replaced fury as Min Ju’s fury and she instinctively staggered back, robbed of her fight and thrust into her flight but Rumi didn’t give her the chance.

Driven by nothing other than animalistic, demonic, instinct, Rumi dropped to all fours and charged at Min Ju, pinning her instantly. The restraints of the demon’s humanity hesitated enough for Min Ju to muster up her last words despite the hand pressing down on her throat.

A plea, a curse, an apology. It was impossible to guess what she would have said because those lasts restraints gave way and uncaged the beast that’s been trapped for so long.

Sunken into unprepared skin, the unforgiving fangs tore through a carotid on the side of Min Ju’s neck. The struggling woman fell limp and died with a face contorted by rage.

Any witness would call her a madwoman. And maybe she was one. Driven to insanity by her own relentless thirst for revenge. But no matter how incoherent her spiral had been, a singular thing was certain. This wasn’t the first time that Min Ju died.

Because all mad women die twice.

At least twice.

Chin slick with blood and brain stripped of all thoughts, Rumi’s knees buckled as she gripped the grass to stay upright, body wracked by the force of her inner demon’s reveal.

Violent waves of crimson rippled through the air as a choir of shrieks and wailed consumed all quiet, echoing and deafening.

No man or beast could name what was happening right now, but the Honmoon screamed ‘RUN!’ and Rumi listened. Warning or threat, she didn’t know but they didn’t stay around to figure it out either.

───  ⋅ ∙ ∘ ☽ ༓ ☾ ∘ ⋅ ⋅  ───

Through the fog of life slipping away from her grasp, Celine registered two things.

Firstly, she broke her promise. Min Ju would kill Rumi, and her vow would be reduced to nothing more than empty words said to a dying mother. She failed.

Secondly, Rumi hadn’t been the only demon in hiding. Despite her blurred vision and drooping eyelids, Celine recognized the pretty face of Lisa Jeong contorted by focus and ridden with illuminated patterns as she recited foreign words spoken by a forked tongue.

“You’re a demon.” Celine managed quietly, her voice barely a whisper in her hoarse throat.

“Sorry, love.” Lisa murmured back with a tone surely too soft to be used by someone revealed as monstrous.

Despite the numb ache consuming her body, Celine lifted a palm to cup Lisa’s cheek. The contact burned, the supposed hunter mentor’s skin was flushed unnaturally pink and felt hotter than any flame, but the retired idol still held it anyway, thumb caressing one of the curved fangs overhanging her bottom lip.

Somewhere in the haze of her current mental state, Celine couldn’t help but think that Lisa still looked rather pretty.

───  ⋅ ∙ ∘ ☽ ༓ ☾ ∘ ⋅ ⋅  ───

Congratulations and praise were bestowed upon Mira and Zoey as they stood on the stage, presented to hall full of revered Guardian Incorporated members.

“Mira Kotadoski and Zoey Choi, the most promising of their class since enrolment, have spent little over a month uncovering an anomaly that has been right under our noses for years.” The lead councillor announced proudly as he pinned golden badges to their chests. “I can’t think of more deserving people to be awarded the title of official hunters.”

This was wrong. This was all so wrong. The shame burning beneath Mira’s skin was wrong. The tears pricking at Zoey’s eyes were wrong. This was supposed to be the proudest moment of their life. But it wasn’t.

They couldn’t dare feel proud when their thoughts were flood with the endless cruel possibilities of what could be happening to Rumi.

Rumi who had impacted them so greatly with a singular, stiff nod. Rumi who had terrified them with her presence but simply offered them dumplings. Rumi who sat with them at lunch and talked like it was her first time discussing anything other than business but still seemed so happy just to be there.

Rumi whose patterns had glowed without her knowledge when she fled from the classroom after they all said the same thing. Rumi who they had betrayed in loyalty to their mission.

Holding hands as they bowed out of nothing but trained obligation, Mira and Zoey, dressed in their fanciest of clothes, both quivered with regret as they accepted their new title. The titles they’d spent years bickering over and used to want nothing more than.

The titles that now failed in comparison to the ache of knowing what they did.

Through tear blurred vision, they watched the crowd cheering for them with their best looks of faux pride until the Honmoon presented colours only they could see despite the countless other hunters in the crowd. Hues of distressed violets ran through the air and broke through the numbness of their guilt.

Purple!

The blinding purple shimmered through the hall and that was they didn’t doubt what it meant. Rumi was in trouble. Rumi needed them.

No spoken agreement was needed as Zoey and Mira ran through the event like mad dogs being beckoned urgently by their master. The Honmoon bellowed melodically again as soon as they exited the building and there she was.

Rumi.

This beast stood on all fours with skin littered in purple patterns and stained by alarming red didn’t look like Rumi. But they knew it was her. It was so recognizably her because despite how monstrous she appeared now; an unmistakable softness remained in her glowing yellow eyes.

Words wouldn’t have been any use at all in this situation, so no one even attempted to speak.

Instead, they reached, arms outstretched, apologetic and desperate. And she ran.

Mira and Zoey fell to their knees; tear filled gazes fixated to the spot where Rumi had been only moments ago but wasn’t anymore.

Leaping over them with inhuman agility, the demon scaled the wall of the building the junior hunters had just exited and reached the top. She hit the roof running. She didn’t pause or look back.

The teenage girl Rumi that ate more dumplings than necessary and struggled with basic conversations wasn’t there anymore, not right now. That person was slumbering in the back of her mind where this demon had been. All this demon knew was the urge to run and she didn’t restrain herself from doing so.

Only managing to turn their heads in time to see a purple blur growing further away until it disappeared, Mira and Zoey watched her go, bolted to the ground by emotion.

───  ⋅ ∙ ∘ ☽ ༓ ☾ ∘ ⋅ ⋅  ───

Despite how things may seem, this wasn’t goodbye. It wasn’t even a ‘see you later’.

It was just silence that held space for anything to happen next.

Notes:

in apology I offer you my 'Huntrix: the main series' full of completed individual fics in chronological order, all with no cliff hangers, happy endings and much more fluff (⁠ ⁠◜⁠‿⁠◝⁠ ⁠)⁠♡

feedback is greatly appreciated!
(´▽`ʃ♡ƪ)

Series this work belongs to:

• Part 3 of Huntrix: AUs