Work Text:
(Image: kakapo bird)
Night had fallen over New Zealand’s remote forests, and the trees had come alive with sound. Chirps, squeaks, and rustles masked Yoo Joonghyuk’s careful footsteps over the fallen branches that blanketed the forest floor.
Yoo Joonghyuk was on a mission. The Seoul Research Institute didn’t approve of it, but Yoo Joonghyuk believed that it was extremely crucial for his study to be published and read by environmental conservationists, because Yoo Joonghyuk was a god among environmental researchers and his articles were worshiped like they were the Scriptures.
Others called his standards for data “ridiculous”, but Yoo Joonghyuk could never underdeliver. He always needed the most accurate and up-to-date information known to man. Most of the time, this meant doing it himself, which is why he was currently prowling the night for a census of the current New Zealand kakapo population.
“Estimates won’t work,” he had argued passionately back home. “We know that the kakapo are dying, but it’s all purely stipulation. We have virtually no data to back it up.”
The higher-ups shuddered at the memory of the latest team’s disastrous attempt at documenting the kakapo population. They had set off in high spirits, vanishing into the forests, expecting to return as heroes with the elusive data.
That was a month ago, and they had never been heard from again.
“It’s dangerous,” one of the board members argued. “You’re our most valuable lab researcher, Dr. Yoo Joonghyuk. Your genius will be put to better use here.”
The old man cowered at Yoo Joonghyuk’s withering glare. “No. Field research is just as important.” The panel looked conflicted still, so Yoo Joonghyuk did what he always did and placed an Imperial Order. “If you don’t fund me, I’ll go on my own. I’m taking Lee Hyunsung.”
The panel head cursed. He turned to his correspondents, murmuring up a storm. Yoo Joonghyuk eyed the cluster of shiny, bald heads and strode out of the conference room wordlessly before his so-called superiors had even finished their discussion. As he thought, the institute was nothing without him.
Yoo Joonghyuk hated humans.
Lee Hyunsung was waiting for him outside.
“Did you get permission?” he asked, hopeful.
“Yes.” He didn’t really, but Lee Hyungsung didn’t have to know. If the board didn’t grant them funding, Yoo Joonghyuk would just have to gently persuade them. “Pack your bags. We leave tomorrow.”
They got their grant by the end of the hour, and they were off to New Zealand the day after.
–
Back in the forest, Yoo Joonghyuk spotted a giant green lump of feathers and froze. Slowly, he set his equipment down and paged Lee Hyunsung.
A kakapo.
The world’s most glorious bird – stunning green coat, beady black eyes, beautiful white highlights – bobbed happily as it dug a hole in the forest floor. The round head and even rounder body made it look slightly chubby as its feet scratched at the dirt in a frenzy. When it deemed the hole wide enough, it settled itself into the pit with a satisfied ‘skraaaak !’
Yoo Joonghyuk hated humans, but he loved birds. He wanted to squish its cheeks.
The bird lay low in its hole, ignorant of its observer who was uncharacteristically snapping pictures with his phone like a madman. This would be his new lock screen, Yoo Joonghyuk decided.
It would be a while before the mating ritual began, Yoo Joonghyuk guessed. This is what people would dub, ‘the early bird gets the worm’, and Yoo Joonghyuk had to begrudgingly admit that the term, however stupid it may be, applied this time. He hated that saying with a vengeance and would be the first to argue that the early bird did not in fact get the worm because earthworms are diurnal and would therefore not be active in the wee hours of the early morning, so the early bird would be left there to sit and stare at the unmoving soil in vain as other, better-rested birds came out at more reasonable times and snagged all the worms before the early bird could even react in its sleep-addled mind.
The kakapo, which had been slowly rearing its head back, suddenly let out an ear-shattering scream.
Yoo Joonghyuk nearly toppled over. Only years of field experience kept him from tumbling back to the camp from whence he came, and he cursed as the bird tipped backwards and snapped its neck back up, screeching all the while.
Ah, the glorious mating calls of the celebrated owl-parrot. Yoo Joonghyuk reverently brought out his phone camera once again. He would post this on the Internet.
The kakapo screamed for a little while more, then its calls receded into the characteristic wheezing of Stage Two of the kakapo mating song.
Suddenly, the bird’s green head snapped straight towards Yoo Joonghyuk. His breath hitched, and he tried to stay as unmoving as physically possible as the bird continued wheezing its funny little ‘ ching ’s in his direction.
The kakapo stood slowly and waddled towards Yoo Joonghyuk, who dared not breathe. Any closer, and the researcher thought he might spontaneously combust. It would be a wonderful, happy death.
Crack .
The bird froze at the sound of crackling branches underfoot, and so did the blood in Yoo Joonghyuk’s veins.
Crack .
Anything that interrupted them now, be it predator or prey, would suffer great pain by Yoo Joonghyuk’s own hands.
Crack .
The bird fled.
“Damn,” Yoo Joonghyuk bit out as Lee Hyunsung’s worried face peeked out from the trees.
“Is everything okay, Dr. Yoo?”
One look at his assistant’s wide eyes quelled most of the murderous thoughts crossing Yoo Joonghyuk’s mind at the moment.
“Yes,” he sighed, suddenly very tired. “Kakapo sighting. I’ve recorded observational data.”
Lee Hyunsung’s face broke out into a wide smile. “Really? I’ve never seen one for myself!”
…Yoo Joongyuk really couldn’t stay mad at him. “You will,” he said begrudgingly. “Keep looking, I’m going back to camp.”
The trudge back to their tent felt so bitter and lonely that Yoo Joonghyuk almost didn’t hear the mating cries of yet another wild kakapo. Immediately, he dropped to the floor, eyes wide.
Two kakapo! In one night!
It took some edging around to pinpoint the sound. A flash of green caught his eye, and he looked between the gaps of the trees to see…
A man?
The stranger, decidedly not Lee Hyunsung and therefore not supposed to be on protected land, was dressed in a white lab coat. His pale face and dark hair were streaked with mud, and he was sitting in a shallow hole in the forest floor while screeching like he was one with the kakapo, intent on finding a mate within his own bird kin.
Yoo Joonghyuk didn’t even register his own decision to move before he was before the man, dangling him over his own fake-kakapo pit by the collar.
“What the fuck do you think you’re doing.”
The man stared at him, stunned for words. Or choking, but Yoo Joonghyuk couldn't bring himself to care.
“Speak,” he demanded, unrelenting. “This is restricted land. Get out.”
The man’s hands came up to clutch at the arm that was holding him in the air. He wheezed, then finally opened his mouth to speak, smirking in an infuriating way that made Yoo Joonghyuk want to chuck him into a tree. “Do you want me to talk or leave? Because I can’t do both.”
Yoo Joonghyuk actually did throw him back into his hole. “Talk. Who are you.”
The man didn’t answer, too busy coughing up a lung. Yoo Joonghyuk drew his stun gun and aimed.
“Woah, woah! Easy!” the man said weakly, holding up his hands. “I’m Kim Dokja, an environmental researcher. Like you, I’d assume.”
“I’m not,” Yoo Joonghyuk said, unnerved.
Kim Dokja eyed Yoo Joonghyuk’s black lab coat skeptically. “Alright. Can we put the tranquilizer away?”
Yoo Joonghyuk did not put the tranquilizer away. “You didn’t answer me,” he said bluntly. “Who are you.”
Kim Dokja let out a breath, eyes on the barrel. “Well, I was sent here from Seoul a few weeks ago for the kakapo census. We got maybe half of them tagged, then our communications went down and we decided to abandon standard protocol.”
Oh, so he was one of the idiots who got themselves stranded. Still, Yoo Joonghyuk wouldn’t let him go.
“Prove it.”
Kim Dokja looked confused for a moment, then rose slowly. “I can’t say I have any documentation on me now, but if you let me go back to camp–”
“No.”
“As I thought,” he sighed. “Look, my team’s back there too. You could interrogate them if you want.”
Yoo Joonghyuk stared blankly until Kim Dokja averted his gaze.
“I could…prove my affinity with kakapo, I guess,” Kim Dokja suggested, grasping at straws. He looked around, then fixed his gaze on something in the distance. Kneeling, he began to make strangely accurate kakapo calls.
“Shin Yoosung,” Kim Dokja called, and suddenly a kakapo – the same kakapo as before, Yoo Joonghyuk’s kakapo – came running to him. He scooped the kakapo into his arms, then straightened before Yoo Joonghyuk’s stunned gaze.
“This is Shin Yoosung,” Kim Dokja announced proudly. “She’s the friendliest kakapo you’ll find here.”
“...Why was she performing a male mating ritual.”
“Why don’t you ask questions like a normal person.” He knew Kim Dokja was mocking him, but Yoo Joonghuk felt his blood pressure rising anyway. Kim Dokja just smiled at him with that conman smile of his. “I was teaching her. She said she wanted to know.”
That was it, this man was insane. “She’s a bird,” Yoo Joonghyuk pointed out.
Kim Dokja’s eyes widened as he gasped theatrically. “No way! I didn’t know!”
Yoo Joonghyuk turned around and began to walk back to his campsite. Forget this squid, he was going to get some sleep.
“Hey!” Kim Dokja called. “Where’re you going?”
“Away from you.”
He heard footsteps behind him and felt Kim Dokja’s shoulder brush against his. “Let me come, Mr. Not-Scientist.”
Yoo Joonghyuk walked faster.
“Shin Yoosung says you can pet her!”
Yoo Joonghyuk halted and turned to eye Kim Dokja, the sketchiest man Yoo Joonghyuk had ever met.
But…but the kakapo.
“Fine.” Lee Hyunsung would kick him out if he had to. He reached out a hand for the bird, trying to mask his eagerness.
Kim Dokja pulled away. “Take me there first.”
Yoo Joonghyuk glared. “No. You could be a serial killer.”
Kim Dokja looked at him with wide, faux-pleading eyes. “Would Shin Yoosung trust a serial killer?”
Kakapo are notoriously stupid , Yoo Joonghyuk wanted to say, but the way Shin Yoosung’s eyes seemed to bore into his very soul begged to differ. Wordlessly, he turned and led Kim Dokja back to camp.
“If you try to stab me, I’ll kill you.”
“Don’t worry,” Kim Dokja said jovially, matching his pace. “Any weapon I try probably won’t get through all that muscle anyway. What’s your name, anyway? Sunfish Bastard?”
Yoo Joonghyuk scowled. “Yoo Joonghyuk.”
“Hm. Seems strangely familiar. Say, have you ever starred in a fantasy novel? About a depressed regressor who fought the apocalypse that caused the end of the world or something?”
Kim Dokja, Yoo Joonghyuk learned then and there, does not shut up. He chattered Yoo Joonghyuk’s ear off without saying anything useful all the way back to camp.
“You better keep your promise,” Yoo Joonghyuk threatened as the faint glow of the yellow lights came into sight.
“Of course! Shin Yoosung never goes back on her word.”
Lee Hyunsung was already back when Yoo Joonghyuk entered the tent, Kim Dokja in tow. His eyes lit up as he saw his partner, then clouded as they landed on Kim Dokja.
“...Dokja-ssi?”
“Oh! Lee Hyunsung!”
Ah shit, they knew each other.
“I thought your team went missing?” Lee Hyunsung asked, poking Kim Dokja like he wasn’t sure if he was real or not. “What happened?”
Kim Dokja laughed, hiking up Shin Yoosung in his arms. “We got lost! Then we lost communication with Seoul and may have forgotten to send our progress reports, but we’re all doing great. By the way, this is Shin Yoosung!”
Shin Yoosung ‘ skraaaak ’ed happily, and Yoo Joonghyuk’s irritation melted away.
“Can I…?” Yoo Joonghyuk asked haltingly. Kim Dokja nodded, and Yoo Joonghyuk touched Shin Yoosung’s feathers tentatively.
They were so soft. Shin Yoosung pushed her round head against Yoo Joongyuk’s palm, and he feared that he would melt from the inside out. He sank his fingers in deeper, and a faint, sweet smell of musty forest canopies permeated the room.
“It helps them find each other,” Kim Dokja said to him, interrupting his own catch-up session with Lee Hyunsung. “It’s quite a nice smell.”
Yoo Joongyuk raised his eyes to Kim Dokja’s, only just realizing how close they were standing. “You smell like that, too,” Yoo Joonghyuk said. “Really nice, I mean.”
Kim Dokja’s face flushed slightly. “M-must be all the bird shit.”
Yoo Joonghyuk smiled. He could see Lee Hyunsung’s mouth dropping open in his periphery, but he paid it no mind. “Stay with us.”
“...My team…”
“Just for tonight. It’s late.”
Kim Dokja looked down at Shin Yoosung, who had her head happily buried in Yoo Joonghyuk’s pectorals. “Okay.”
A year later, Kim Dokja’s face was buried in those same pectorals.
“And that’s how I knew that you were the one,” he was saying, laughing against his boyfriend’s chest.
“Because of Shin Yoosung?” Yoo Joonghyuk asked. “Or was it the muscles?”
Kim Dokja only hummed in answer, so Yoo Joonghyuk wrapped his arms around him, bringing him closer as his eyes drifted blissfully shut. Kim Dokja felt right in his arms, with his fluffy hair and that sweet, natural scent that never really left him, despite being months away from the forest.
“Now that I think about it,” Kim Dokja said into the silence, “that was a really weird first date.”
Yoo Joonghyuk jerked up with a start, accidentally knocking Kim Dokja off of their couch. “Was that our first date?”
Kim Dokja sat up from the floor reluctantly, rubbing his aching nose. “Yeah? What’s the matter?”
“We’re having a do-over.”
“Why? It was nice!”
“I pointed a gun at you. And choked you on your own collar.”
“It was a tranquilizer! Plus, the whole ‘I’ll kill you’ thing was kind of hot.”
One look at Kim Dokja’s faint flush had Yoo Joonghyuk tackling him to the floor. They didn’t get a do-over that day, or ever, but Yoo Joonghyuk was perfectly fine with that.
In the end, it was that weird mating ritual that drew him to Kim Dokja. Maybe it was more effective than research suggested.