Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

No one was more dismayed than Rumi when seeking Jinu out went from a one-time, maybe two-time occurrence, to a habit. 

It was illogical and dangerous and–and what would Celine say–but despite everything, there was something about him that seemed inevitable. All too quickly, she couldn’t remember a time before him–before his smug face was plastered up on every other billboard, before he was by her side at every music show; warming up backstage and soaking up the fans’ attention onstage and taking up space in her phone every second in between. 

The worst part? Suddenly, he knew her in the way that no one else did, not even her best friends in the world. Suddenly, he knew the most shameful, monstrous part of her, and only drew nearer rather than shoving her away. (Suddenly, she knew the most human part of him, and couldn’t remember why she had hidden at all). 

And suddenly, far too suddenly, he became a permanent fixture in her peripheral vision, her gaze drawing to him like instinct when he entered a room and staying right on him as he flowed like water through the choreography to his stupid song, as his eyes inevitably found her own. 

So yes, it became a habit. One that looked like this: 

“Rumi!” Jinu straightened as he entered the waiting room at Show Champion, still breathing hard from his performance. He waved the other boys along, muttering something quickly. Rumi could only guess at why he kept putting his all into every single stage. It hadn’t come up yet in their steadily growing number of civil conversations; maybe she would ask him next time. 

She blinked. Raised a hand in stoic greeting. “Jinu.”

A smile twitched at his mouth. “Were you…waiting for me?”

No. No, of course she hadn’t waited for him, hadn’t told the girls to go ahead without her, hadn’t picked nervously at her manicure as his laughter drew nearer from down the hallway. “Yeah,” she said. She lifted her chin, measuring his reaction. 

He smiled properly this time, a pleased little expression that lingered for a moment. “Gosh, Rumi. I mean, what would your members say?” Turning away from her, he grabbed a towel and ran it furiously through his sweaty hair. 

“Oh, they’d be overjoyed,” Rumi deadpanned. “Big Saja Boys fans, all of us.”

Jinu flopped onto a couch, sighing wistfully. “If only.”

After a moment, Rumi joined him. “If only,” she agreed. 

He tilted his head at her. His hair, towelled free of the gel that had confined it through the performance, fell prettily across his brow. “Are you trying to tell me something?”

Methodically, Rumi observed the flecks of glitter around his eyes. The faded remnants of lip tint. She didn’t answer. “Why are you trying so hard to be a proper idol?” She asked instead. 

“I am a proper idol, Rumi.” 

Rumi wished he would stop saying her name like that. “No, I’m serious. I mean, you already have a fanbase after releasing one song.” She applauded herself secretly for keeping the bitterness from her voice. Huntrix had blown up practically overnight too. Then again, Huntrix had trained for years on end, danced until every inch of them ached and agonized over lyrics in every second they had to spare. But that was besides the point. “You don’t need to work so hard for every performance.”

“‘Course I do. It’s hard work.” He looked at her seriously. “If you all worked a little less hard, we wouldn’t have to try to be better.”

A strange feeling crept over her. She searched for something to say in response. “So. All that fanservice is just so you can be more impressive than us?” 

“Jealous?” He grinned. 

She wrinkled her nose, thankful that her stage makeup kept any hint of color from peeking through on her face. “As if. Besides, I don’t believe you. They love you, sincerely. You just want their souls, and no part of stealing souls requires…everything you’re doing.”

He looked away from her, and the light that had caught on his glittery eyes fell away. “It's fun, I guess. I like that they like me. Why wouldn't I do my best?”

“You're hurting them.”

“I'm doing what I have to do. Sometimes that means acting selfishly. You should know.”

Rumi drew back. “We’re not the same. Nothing I have to do is selfish. All of it is for them!” 

Jinu’s expression twisted. He reached out an arm, passed his fingers just barely over where she knew her patterns were. “Is it really? Pretty selfish of you to be here right now, lying to them.”

“I’m not lying to anyone!” Rumi’s voice rose to a yell. She was protecting them–all she had done as long as she had known Mira and Zoey was protect them. How dare Jinu, of all people, call her selfish? Rumi shoved his arm away, rocketing to her feet. “You don’t know me better than my best friends do. Stop acting like you do.” She hurried out of the room without a second look back. The skin below her patterns seemed to burn.

The next time they met, he was the one waiting for her. “Sorry,” he said. The bustle of the MCountdown backstage seemed to slow down, quiet around him. “I don’t want to fight again, honest.”

“It’s okay,” Rumi said automatically. She glanced around to make sure her members weren’t around. A brief silence stretched between them.

“It’s okay?” repeated Jinu finally. He leaned closer, eyes narrowed.

Rumi reached out a finger and pushed him back by the forehead. “Do you want me to be mad at you?”

“You can be mad at me.” Gently, he eased her finger away and clasped it between them.  “But…it’s like you said. Your friends know you best. Why hide from them?”

“I have to. I don’t have a choice.”

“And?”

She laughed once, dumbfounded. “And what?” She registered their hands dropping, Jinu briefly letting go only to grab her hand again properly.

“And…what else? You’re not supposed to be here, talking to me. But you still are.” He tilted his head, swung their joined hands a little, smiled as if he wanted nothing more than to know everything about her deepest shame.

Rumi tore her eyes away, and the dam broke. “We hate demons. Maybe Mira and Zoey…m-maybe they’d hate me too, if they knew. Maybe they wouldn’t. It doesn’t matter either way, because there’s no one that hates…these,” she gestured at her shoulders roughly, “more than I do. So why would I want to tell them?”

Jinu’s hand stilled. There was space for a breath, two, three, before he responded, and Rumi spent it blinking rapidly at the wall behind his head. His voice was soft when he asked, “Do you hate mine just as much?”

When she looked back at him, his patterns had spread across his face–slashing across his cheek, winding across the bridge of his nose and around his mouth, branching over his forehead, right where she had touched him. Yes , she should have said. There was nothing uglier than a demon’s patterns, nothing more terrifying than the thought of her own patterns creeping over her face. 

But his gaze didn’t waver, and he continued looking down at her with the crooked hint of a smile approaching his expression. 

Rumi opened her mouth, then closed it. “It’s different. When it’s you.”

“Mine should be uglier. I deserve them. I gave my soul, and I’ve done all the things you hate me for, but you’re…human. You’re a hero. What do you have to feel ashamed of?” Jinu sounded so earnest, voice low and eyes wide. 

Celine’s warnings rang again in Rumi’s mind. Hide, hide, hide. No one can know. But they were quiet this time, quieter than they had been for as long as she could remember.

“And you?” Rumi cleared her throat and looked up at him with a small smile. “You deserve to feel ashamed, and be hated, because of something you did centuries ago?” 

“It’s not the same.” Jinu leaned back, shoulders slumping imperceptibly. 

“I know you don’t hate us. That you don’t want to hurt any more people. You’re just as human as me.” Her heartbeat thudded in her ears as she watched him, as the gold in his eyes flickered back to warm brown.

“I’m not…you don’t–” Jinu cut himself off, sighing. “Do you think I don’t wish, more than anyone, that things could be different?” he asked, hushed. He wouldn’t meet her eyes. 

She squeezed his hand tight, neither of them having bothered to let go as they spoke. “They could be.”

He finally agreed to join her plan, and it took everything in her to keep yet another secret from Zoey and Mira, especially when her desire to keep the first, most glaring secret was fading by the day. Not that her will (or lack thereof) to keep a secret was going to stop them from being nosey.

“Can you get off your phone and come join society, Rumi?” Mira asked pointedly after the fourth time she caught Rumi staring loopily at her screen. 

“Are you talking to someone? Is that what’s happening?” Zoey probed. She grinned obnoxiously. 

“No! No. ” Rumi waved them away. Another notification blinked up from her screen, and she tapped it immediately.

your idol ❤️‍🔥 6:51 PM

Rumi, did you enjoy the stage today? >_<

Rumi squinted at the message. It was quickly followed by a–frankly embarrassing–selfie. God only knew why Saja Boys fans paid real, hard-earned money for this awful idol messaging app. She’d used the company card for her own subscription, back when they’d first showed up…just to keep tabs on her new competitors. She reminded herself again to cancel the subscription when she had time. 

But…well. As long as she had the app, wasn’t it better to make the most of the company money that had gone towards it?

Rumi   6:53 PM

You did well. Rest up!

Jinu winked up from her screen. Rumi locked the screen quickly and let out a frustrated yell, tossing her phone far away from her. With all the things she had to worry about, why was he so frequently at the front of her mind? Was it because he knew her secret? Or because he had the words to make her forget why she kept it a secret at all? Or because of that way he kept smiling at her, like–

Her phone dinged. Rumi let out another loud, pained sound. 

“Seriously, what’s going on?” Mira muttered. 

Somehow, it only got worse from there. Like this:

At a quarter to midnight, Jinu fell into step beside Rumi, slinging an arm around her shoulder. “Apparently Inkigayo reserved us a room to congratulate us on our first win, but we’re leaving. You and Huntrix should go grab some of the food.” He didn’t comment on how tired she must have looked. She had been up since at least three in the morning for pre-recordings, then hair and makeup, then the show, then walking off the stage without a trophy. 

Rumi sighed, patting his arm lightly. He hadn’t ever made it possible for her to truly resent him. “Let’s go together. I’ll show the girls later.”

He brightened, despite the identical exhaustion weighing on his body. “You know, music shows give us so much celebratory cake. If I’d known idols get spoiled like this, all the time, I’d have pursued this much earlier,” he chattered.

“Four hundred years earlier?” Rumi snorted.

They entered the empty Saja Boys-dedicated room, and Jinu turned to her with a reproachful look that quickly gave way to a stupid little smile. He said something else, too, but Rumi tuned it out to focus on staring at him. He was so beautiful for a moment, unbearably so. The dim light in the room languished on his skin, and still he glowed . Unearthly.

And this:

Her voice was regaining strength, steadily. She knew the reason why. 

The Tiger appeared in the studio one night, long after everyone else had gone to sleep. There was a melody in her head that she had to record before she could think of sleeping, and she had an endless list of tasks to get done. She missed being able to tell her members–her sisters, really–about everything. 

The Tiger purred, pawing at the sheets of paper strewn across the floor. “Oh, leave that alone,” Rumi groaned. She rubbed her eyes. “Are you here for a reason?”

The Tiger dropped another card into her hand, then vanished. Rumi tore the card open.

Why are you still here? (Meet me in the lobby when you're done.)

Jinu

Her pulse quickened. 

“So. Why do you work so hard?” Was the first thing he asked after she rushed out to meet him. His cheeks were still flushed from the nighttime cold, but he held out a takeout bag proudly. She hugged him tight and let him go, a wonderful, warm, too-brief thing. He stayed close, looking down at her with softened eyes.

"You're here too," she pointed out. Then, “What would I do if I didn’t work hard?”

“Steal souls from innocent human beings, maybe.”

Rumi refused to laugh at that. She smiled wryly, reaching up to push a wisp of dark hair away from his eyes. “Thanks for the food.”

Wide-eyed, Jinu shrugged and changed the subject. “I heard you singing, a little. I mean, I hear you all the time, but…you sound good.”

“Yeah?” She tipped back on her heels, pleased. It’s because of you , she didn’t say. His expression was impossibly still as he watched her.

“I was thinking earlier that…I’m a hunter because my mom was a hunter,” Rumi mused. They wandered towards a chaise as she continued, and she was thankful for it as soon as they sat down. She didn’t know how much longer she could handle the full force of his attention, face-to-face. “But I’m a singer because I sing, because I’ve practiced and I’ve worked hard to be good. So…there’s your answer. I work hard because my voice is all I have.” 

There was a moment, two, three, before he responded. “I gave up everything for the chance to sing, you know. And…for the first time in all these years, I don’t regret it. I wouldn’t have gotten to hear you if I hadn’t.”

Rumi melted a little in her next exhale. How could this boy have ever been her enemy? How could she ever pretend to hate him, even in front of her members? She leaned to rest her head on his shoulder silently. The song that had been playing in her mind came to an end, softly.

Jinu grabbed hold of her hand and lifted it ever so slowly, like it was something fragile; fleeting. Her heart swooped at the press of his mouth to her knuckles, then the gentle release. “Rumi,” he said, red-faced and starry-eyed. “Let’s perform together sometime.”

“Yeah, okay,” she said, breathless. “I’d like to sing with you.”

And, finally, this:

She found him napping before the Saja Boys were scheduled to go on Music Bank, in the room that ideally would have been her own solitary napping spot. 

I like you , Rumi thought abruptly, furiously, as if the force of it could somehow reach his sleeping mind. I like you so much. The words sat there, right at the tip of her tongue, at once horrible and horribly mundane. But they weren’t spoken, so he never turned to receive them, and instead peacefully continued his nap in the middle of the floor. His eyelashes fanned out against his cheeks, where his stage makeup had gradually rubbed away. 

Rumi’s pulse marched steadily on. 

If he didn’t know it already, there would be other times to say it. After the Honmoon was golden, after she was fixed and he was human…they would have time. They would have all the time in the world.

Chapter Text

There were several truths that defined Jinu’s short time on Earth and his eternity below it. One: he was selfish. Two: he needed to sing like he needed to breathe. Three: no amount of wishing or grief or guilt would change his fate. 

The first two truths had been of his choosing, so the third was an appropriate consequence. Simple, to the point: if he ever dared to forget the path he had chosen, he would be reminded, over and over and over until it was crystal clear. 

So it was that he awoke with Gwima’s voice echoing in his ears and a sparkly jacket spread across his heaving chest. The jacket slipped into his lap as he scrambled to sit up and catch his breath. His eyes were wet.

Glowing, slightly blurry red numbers on his watch informed him that there was still time before he had to go on stage. He smacked his lips a few times, wincing at the sandy taste of his mouth, then tossed the jacket-that-was-not-his away with a shuddering breath. He had no idea how Rumi– no, don’t think about Rumi –how professional idols dealt with schedules like this all the time.

Jinu was exhausted. 

That, too, was new: human feelings like exhaustion had become foreign in the centuries since he had become a monster. Truthfully, he didn’t want to think about it–not the incessant exhaustion of promotions week, not the gentle tug of sleep that arrived like clockwork each night otherwise. Not the hunger, or the thirst, or any of the other terribly human pains that were slowly creeping back. 

He couldn’t afford to think about it.

The silence of his chosen pre-show napping room was broken by a soft, snuffling snore from the couch. Jinu startled, jumping to his feet warily. 

Rumi was curled up tightly on the couch, bare arms hugging herself, unbraided hair spilling down the back of the armrest. Jinu took a breath, looking up to the ceiling for a long moment before stepping closer to crouch in front of her.

Patterns unfurled down her arms, dipping and twisting like calligraphy. Jinu stared at them, frozen. It was strange, looking at the same marks that had turned his own reflection loathsome and feeling awe rather than disgust. 

Tentatively, he reached out, index finger hovering a safe distance from her skin. He followed a line that crawled up from her bicep, twirling across her collarbone and vanishing behind the curtain of her dark hair. Of course her patterns would be beautiful. What else could they be, on someone like her?

Maybe it was surprising because it was the first time he had seen them properly, only the second time he had seen them at all. Rumi was meticulous about keeping her arms covered, even around him. 

A foreign pain jolted through his chest. The jacket. “God, Rumi,” he muttered, shuffling around to grab her sparkly jacket from the floor. Carefully, he laid it over her, refusing to imagine her doing the same for him.

Her brow wrinkled as the jacket touched her skin and she curled up tighter, making a sleepy noise of protest. Jinu stopped breathing. 

“Just. Five more minutes, Zoey,” Rumi mumbled. She didn’t open her eyes. 

Jinu exhaled slowly, resting his forehead on the couch next to hers. Truth number three , he reminded himself. No amount of wishing…no amount of wanting . No amount of begging, praying, breathing side by side in an empty room, daring to be human; no amount of it would change that he was not allowed to be free.

But forget Jinu’s truths. Here are some things that he had learned about Rumi:

One: she was the worst type of workaholic. Always working when she was meant to be sleeping, only sleeping in the pockets of time that she could fit into her schedule.

Two: she was subscribed to his Bubble. 

Three: she did not know that he knew that she was subscribed to his Bubble. This, of course, was because he had only chanced upon her lockscreen while she had been catching up on her aforementioned tightly scheduled nap:

your idol ❤️‍🔥 has sent you a message!

The notification had glowed mockingly from her screen. Funny. That was his display name. 

Then he looked again, eyes wide, and his jaw fell open just a little. Not for the first time, he felt his heart clench. 

She was never going to live this down. 

Four: she had a bad habit of getting close, and touching him in the smallest, most unbearably casual ways. A brush against his forehead to push the bangs out of his eyes. A press between his eyebrows to cure the wrinkle that had apparently formed there. 

“I know you’re desperate to contact me, but…” was how he meant to start the conversation. She hugged him tight before he could think of how he meant to end the sentence.

“I’d like to sing with you,” she said later, shy and earnest, and ended the conversation.

Heartache. That was one of those feelings too, wasn’t it? One of those terribly human pains that he had forgotten.

The last music show arrived far too soon.

Rumi cried that day, and Jinu knew because the Tiger led him to the roof of the broadcasting station where she had slumped against a railing, shoulders trembling. Jinu stumbled forward instinctively, heart clenching. 

It had rained the night before, and mist now folded around him as he went. He imagined it springing back like dewy grass to fill each space he left behind.

The Tiger stopped abruptly, and Jinu stumbled over his own feet. A pebble skittered loudly away from the pair. Rumi spun around, sword held high, the glow of the blade glinting on her tear-tracked face. 

“It’s just me,” Jinu placated, hands in the air.

“Oh. You. I was,” Rumi’s gaze flitted around, eyes wild, “practicing. It’s peaceful up here.” She didn’t put the sword down. 

“I don’t doubt it,” said Jinu drily, slightly cross-eyed as he tried to stare the blade down. He didn’t dare to ask what she had been practicing. 

Slowly, she lowered the sword. Her shoulders remained tense. “Sorry…sorry, Jinu. You just surprised me.”

“You’ve changed so much. Can you imagine Rumi from a month ago apologizing for wanting to fight?” Jinu wiped a fake tear from the corner of his eye.

“Do you want me to fight you?” Rumi cracked a smile. She didn’t bother wiping her own eyes. 

“As if you could,” he challenged, eyes widened and eyebrows raised. 

Rumi fixed him with a blank stare.

Then she was lunging, and he was leaping away, and it was all too familiar. Comfortable, even. He let his human disguise fall away, and used the second that she paused to stare at him with what seemed like wonder to swipe at her in return. 

Rumi shrieked with laughter. 

“Your hair looks pretty like this!” Jinu called out, twirling behind her to snag a lock of the hair tumbling down her back. 

Rumi twisted, sending her sword swinging in a wide arc, and yelled in frustration. Jinu vanished, reappearing a safer distance from her. 

She charged towards him again with a flurry of kicks and slashes, forcing him backwards to the railing. Her eyes flashed. This time, he didn’t take the easy way out.

He knocked the sword out of her hand with a kick and caught it by the blade, placing it right against her neck. “I win. Again,” he said. She breathed heavily, staring at him. 

When she didn't say anything in response, he tilted his head at her inquisitively.

“Your patterns look pretty like this,” she said finally, echoing his words from earlier. Eyes glowing, lips pursed, she brushed her knuckles across his cheek. 

Abruptly, it became clear to Jinu that he had been obsessing over the wrong rule for a long time. It had been him all along, his choice, his first and last truth: the only thing that had defined him for as long as he had lived and as long as he had hurt was selfishness. That was all he knew how to be. 

He was selfish; he would hold onto her a little longer.

He let the sword fall to the ground, let himself step closer into her space with a strange, reckless courage. She didn’t move away.

“And I let you win, by the way,” she said over his shoulder instead. 

“Okay,” he whispered. Her hair smelled nice. Something fruity, maybe. “Why were you crying?”

He counted the heartbeats that passed before she sighed deeply, slumping against him. “There’s just this song…” He hummed at her to continue. “I’m the one who helped write it, but I hate it so much. I can’t perform it, but I can’t tell Zoey and Mira that I can’t perform it. Why I can’t perform it.”

“And the reason you can’t perform it is…?” 

“You!” she burst out. She knocked a fist against his shoulder. “It’s all your fault.”

He pulled away, grinning. “Oh? Do elaborate.” 

“I won’t,” she said firmly, chin held high. There was no trace of tears left on her face. Jinu felt his smile softening into something awfully fond. 

Flustered, she looked away from him. Her gaze caught on the knotted bracelet around his wrist. Then she smiled too, a teasing tilt of her lips that seemed to foreshadow what she would say next. 

Quickly, Jinu hid his wrist behind his back. His neck burned. He coughed loudly, said “W-well, I have to get going!” in a voice that sounded more like a squeak, then turned himself invisible. 

Rumi stood frozen for a moment before she folded in on herself, gasping with quiet laughter. Jinu watched her helplessly. The smile didn’t leave her eyes for a long time.

The fact was that no matter how hard he tried to ignore it, Jinu was running out of time. 

It didn’t matter that Rumi made him feel human; he was a demon. Feeling human wouldn’t get Gwima out of his head. 

So, dutifully, he came up with a plan for the Idol Awards and reported back to the other demons. He ignored the sick feeling rising from the bottom of his stomach and tightening around his throat the whole time.

It didn’t matter. If she hated him enough, it wouldn’t hurt her when he left. 

Time was running out, but Jinu was selfish, and so the night before the Awards, he sent the Tiger to find her one last time. He sat on a swing in the playground near the Huntrix dorm and amused himself with kicking up mulch as the sky turned orange, then dusky blue. 

Rumi arrived with a gentle shove to his shoulders and a loud “BOO!” in his ear. Jinu huffed out a laugh. 

“Not this time,” he said, rolling his eyes. His feet tapped anxiously against the mulch that he had managed to carve into a slight ditch. 

Rumi fell onto the swing beside him. “I tried.” She played with the end of her loose braid, which she had pulled over one shoulder.

Jinu tried to think of what to say next. That song you told me about? The one you regret making, because of me. Then what? Was he going to give himself away, give up the chance to forget his worst memories, when he was this close?

Then, maybe, simply… I like you a lot. Like they were normal, like she wouldn’t hate him within twenty-four hours. Jinu almost laughed at the thought. His knee continued to bounce nervously. 

“Is there…something you wanted to say?” Rumi asked finally. 

“Oh…yeah. I called you out here, because I had something to say,” he said dumbly. 

Rumi reached out a hand and placed it hesitantly on his knee, feather-light. He went still. “I’m sorry,” he said.

Rumi laughed. “For what?”

Jinu inhaled deep, leaning back to look at the inky sky. Stars were beginning to creep out. “Ah. Because of how badly you’re gonna lose tomorrow,” he joked weakly. 

Rumi rose from the swing, hands flying to her hips. “That’s funny,” she said, eyes narrowed. “Anything else?”

Jinu stood too, then. He nodded wordlessly after a moment. Framed by the warm glow of the nearby streetlights, he held his breath and leaned close. “Tomorrow…” he began.

But Rumi’s eyes had fluttered shut. Oh.

Jinu froze. His gaze flitted over her face, the angles of it–the strands of hair that had escaped her rushed braid, the painted-on pink blush and the rising red of her ears, the pout of her lips. He flexed his hand, curled it into a fist, let it go. 

Tomorrow, they would go back to brushing past each other backstage, not letting their gazes linger. Tomorrow, she would relearn to hate him, truly. 

But tomorrow, still, was far enough away. He bent to smile against her forehead, listened to her soft intake of breath. “Good luck. Good luck tomorrow, is what I wanted to say.”

Today, his heartbeat thudded in his chest, echoed in his ears, pulsed defiantly at his wrist. Today, he was human enough.