Chapter Text
They do training on Monday morning—extra ab workout included. Rumi thinks her abs feel a little more sore than normal, but she goes about her day pushing that feeling out of her mind.
Food doesn't seem very appealing to her, but she tries her best to eat some at each meal—wanting to replenish the calories she has burned.
By dinner time, she is mostly pushing it around the plate. It's not even that it is unappealing—she just doesn't feel especially hungry. By the time she crawls into bed, she's tired of this soreness and desperately ready to sleep.
When Rumi wakes on Tuesday, her core still feels sore. She didn't think she had gone especially hard in training the day before, but she must have if it was still affecting her like this. It's a little worse now than the day before, but it's not the first, or probably the last, time that she has felt it after an ab workout day. She does some light stretches in her bedroom before heading downstairs to join the girls for breakfast. They have a lot to do today.
Breakfast is fine. She still doesn't exactly feel hungry for it, but she eats it anyway. Then they are off to do some promotions, starting at the same morning shoot and then spreading out to three different locations throughout the city.
The group shoot goes well enough. It's a photographer they have worked with before, and she always makes the session flow easily—Rumi makes a mental note to thank Bobby for booking with her.
They end a little early and are able to grab lunch together before they split up. Zoey and Mira rush ahead of her, already ravenous, but Rumi isn't sure she feels that hungry. Their breakfast wasn't that big, but they also haven't done much this morning but hold different poses on the same small set, so she figures she just hasn't worked up an appetite.
However, she doesn't want to worry Zoey or Mira, so she orders something small to nibble on, trying to stay semi-engaged in the conversation.
After lunch, she hugs them tightly before saying goodbye to get into the separate cars waiting for them. When she gets to her afternoon location—a solo radio interview—she takes a few minutes in the dressing room to stretch again. The pain is still lingering. If anything, holding her abs tight all morning—for the photo shoot—has increased it a little.
She puts on her best smile and chats with the interviewer anyway. She's not unused to hiding discomfort.
By the end of the interview, the feeling in what she thought was her abs has started swirling lower in her abdomen—an uncomfortable cramping taking hold, almost reminding her of her period.
Her next engagement for the day—a meeting at Sunlight Entertainment—has her sitting down for a couple of hours. The pain is a little better throughout that, but when she stands at the end to bow, the twinge she feels in her right side has her almost crying out with the intensity of it. She keeps her smile plastered on though—faults and fears must never be seen, after all.
Celine—a senior part of the team here—is looking closely at her as they wait for the others to leave the room.
She turns to face Rumi fully as the last of the board members trickles out, looking her up and down. "What was that, Rumi?"
"Hmm?"
"It looked like you flinched. Did you get injured in a hunt? You know you can call me if it's something you can't treat on your own, right?"
(She does know it. There have been a couple of unfortunate incidents since their debut where Celine has had to come into Seoul to both help treat an injury, and help cover for her.
Once, the injury had been bad enough that their rapid hunter healing—hers boosted by her unique physiology—didn't work fast enough for several engagements. She had stayed cooped up in Celine's Seoul apartment—separate from the hanok they had trained at—until she had healed. The girls had thought she was off running some kind of errand for Celine while they held down the fort.)
Rumi nods, quick to reassure. "I think I just went a little hard yesterday in our morning workout. I'm okay."
Celine nods once, slowly, and gestures for her to leave the room first. She does her level best not to wince while doing it. Each step with her right foot has started giving a sharp pang.
Back in the car, she hunches forward, curling over her stomach instinctively, finding some relief in the position.
Getting out is painful, but she is able to resist the urge to cry out with a tightly clenched jaw.
Each step on the way in is part agony.
It doesn't usually work out this way, but while Rumi is waiting for the elevator back in the tower, the other two simultaneously arrive. When they all step into the elevator together—Zoey already chattering—Mira squints at her with a slight frown.
"What is it, Mir?"
"You look a little pale. Did something happen?"
"No, I'm okay!" She's quick to hold up both hands in a placating gesture.
Mira's eyes narrow a little further, discerning. And now Zoey is squinting at her suspiciously too. This is the exact opposite of what she needs.
She puts on a wider smile, giving them a double thumbs up. "I'm okay guys, I promise."
That seems to assuage them, for the most part, and they switch gears, Zoey talking excitedly about what they are going to do for dinner and after dinner.
She has to resist the urge to sigh.
Dinner is… not sounding very appealing to her right now, but she knows that it would be even more suspicious to them if she didn't eat, so she starts thinking about what to order that won't show how much she doesn't want to eat it. By the time they get up to their floor, Zoey and Mira have decided on Thai food, and she has given Zoey her order. They make their way over to the couch, Mira sitting down heavily and Zoey filling the space to her left side. Rumi pauses at the base of the stairs, and points up.
"I'm gonna go change. Do either of you need anything from upstairs?"
"I'm good, thank you, Rumi!"
"All good, Rums."
She nods, starting up the stairs, ignoring the throb that each step send through her, saying, "Okay. Text me when the food gets here?"
Up in her room, she slumps down onto the foot of her bed, stretching across it. She does need to change clothes, but she just needs a minute. The pain is worse now, though in a smaller area. She is just intensely hoping that her dinner won't upset her stomach.
This isn't the time to be getting sick, but she feels like it already might be too late for that hope. Even the thought of food is sitting like a stone in her stomach.
But she needs to make sure that Mira and Zoey don't worry. So, 'Your faults and fears must never be seen' ringing in her head, she sits up with a huff, holding her stomach.
Well, she can at least get out of these clothes and into something comfier.
She looks at herself in the mirror and sighs. She can see what Mira meant. She unfortunately does look pale, with beads of sweat dotting near her hairline. She can do this, though—she just needs to make it through dinner and then she can claim fatigue and wanting to go to bed early. It's not exactly a lie—she does feel tired. She's just not sure she's going to be able to sleep—anticipating that this vague feeling of nausea might solidify into something worse.
She washes her face and slaps her cheeks to try and get some color back in them.
She's already padding back down the hallway when her phone dings with a text from one of them—the two of them along with Bobby and Celine are the only ones her do-not-disturb unfailingly allows through.
After washing her hands at the kitchen sink, she joins them on the couch, making herself not hold her stomach as she sits down, but wanting to—standing up and sitting down both cause a piercing stab. They have already gone down and grabbed the food from the lobby, and are spreading it out on the living room table. She would be more appreciative if it didn't mean she had to pretend to enjoy her food even sooner.
The smell of the wide variety of foods is mixing together strangely in the air, at least to her nose, but she swallows down the discomfort. It's hard to focus on their conversation, so she doesn't. She lets herself drift into her thoughts, even as she drinks some of the broth and forces down some of the noodles.
Then she sits, nearby them, leaning back, eyes closed—drifting with their voices as the ambiance—holding her bowl in her lap, the warmth feeling nice on her hands and her abdomen, and the pain abated as long as she sits this way.
"—umi?"
She blinks her eyes open and turns her head. They have both trailed off and are looking at her, Mira with furrowed eyebrows and Zoey with wide, concerned eyes.
"Rumi, are you okay?"
"Haha, sorry guys. I guess I'm more worn out from today than I thought." She forces a smile. "I may just go up to bed."
She gets the sense that Mira wants to argue, to push for more info. Maybe she even normally would, but Rumi thinks they are too fresh off of the last argument they had. Tensions had risen about overtraining after an injury, especially because Rumi wouldn't let Mira see said injury in the first place—under the patterns—but Celine had backed Rumi up when Mira and Zoey had tried to go to her, saying that Rumi knew her own limits.
It's not like she wants things to be tense, but she can't afford to have either of them trying to look to closely. Not with what she is.
A tense moment passes, Zoey looking back and forth between them, before Mira sighs and gets up, holding out her hand toward Rumi's bowl. "Let me take that at least. I'll put it in the fridge in a container."
Zoey jumps up too, grabbing the leftovers that Mira doesn't, both of them turning away.
Rumi watches them walk away, so thankful that they won't be looking at her while she gets up. With her smile turning into a grimace, she braces herself and stands as quickly as she can. This time she can't help the slight gasp that escapes her, but when she looks over to check, she's glad to see that neither one of them is looking back on their way toward the kitchen.
"Thanks guys. I'll see you in the morning?" They have tomorrow off and are planning to make a board game day of it—well, after training.
They both look over at her, Mira's jaw ticking. Rumi hustles up the stairs—as well as she can—before Mira can change her mind and say whatever she is so clearly thinking.
Back in her room, she closes the door, locks it, and then sags against it. She really doesn't feel well, now. The broth had seemed okay, going down, so she had tried some of the noodles, but now she almost feels like they are crawling around in her stomach.
With a heavy swallow, she moves away from the door, stripping off her shirt and moving toward the bed. She feels overheated and nauseous and she just wants to lie down.
She curls up on her side, carefully, on top of the blankets, feeling miserable. She hates that she can't let even them see her weak. The other parts of her, of her soul, connected by the Honmoon, and all she can do is lie to them, all the time. A tear rolls from the corner of her eye and once it starts, she can't stop them from pouring out. She's never been more glad for the expensive soundproofing in this place, so she can be sure she's crying these tears for only herself to hear—unless one of them is standing literally right outside the door.
She falls asleep like that for at least a couple of hours, and when she blinks back awake, the room is dark. She's not sure what wakes her, until she tries to roll over and then she's crying out into her pillow. Fuck. It definitely hadn't felt that strong before. It's constant on the right side now, sharp and unyielding, but when she moves. Oh, how it had hurt when she moved. What is going on? She puts a hand to her abdomen. Her stomach feels bloated. Maybe she just needs the bathroom.
She already knows that it's going to be painful to try and get up. She holds a hand up to her mouth and bites into the back of it—it seems rational in the moment—to hold back any sounds. Then, carefully, she rolls over and sits up in one painful movement, muffling a pained moan into her hand.
She feels cold now and she stops at her closet to grab a long sleeve shirt as she goes into the bathroom. She tries to use the toilet, but even peeing feels hard, and nothing else happens. Maybe she has a kidney stone or something? She googles kidney stone symptoms and reads about it for a few minutes before giving up and slowly—carefully—standing.
She washes her hands before grabbing the Tylenol from the cabinet. Now, in front of the mirror, hands braced on the sink, she's surprised at how wrecked she looks. Paler than even before, and bags heavy under her eyes even though she just woke up. She pours out two of the pain meds and swallows them down with water from the sink, and then, feeling too warm again, wets the back of her neck with the cold water.
All the while, the insistent pain is throbbing in her lower right side. She whines. She just wants to sleep off whatever this is. It can't become a thing. She can't go in anywhere, and what? Have her patterns be seen? No, it's better to wait and see. Maybe she'll call Celine in the morning if she needs to. But she already knows what Celine would say. 'Your faults and fears must never be seen'.
She groans. The nausea has only been increasing the longer she stands here, but she feels weak. She wants to—needs to—lie down. She stumbles back into her bedroom and grabs the trashcan from her desk, putting it next to the bed, hoping she won't need it.
She crawls back into the bed, underneath the blanket this time, shivering, and somehow falls back asleep—after some time staring at her closed eyelids, arms wrapped around her middle, trying to keep perfectly still.
Hot, she feels so hot. Something is around her, holding her arms next to her body. She opens her eyes. Where is she? There is red rock everywhere and it's so hot. Is this… the demon realm? No, no, please.
What has she done? Why is she here? She has tried so hard to be good. Lying even when it hurt her. Lying when all she wanted to do was let them in.
She looks down and it's her own braid wrapped around her, keeping her arms next to her body, coiled around her and tightening like a snake. What happened? The last thing she remembers is… dinner? No, she had gone to bed, hadn't she?
Tears are running down her face as she looks up again.
Where is she? She's standing in the middle of a street, arms still restrained. Hadn't she just been in the—
pain
—god, what is that? It feels like she's been stabbed. She looks down and… What? No, it can't be… She doesn't...
The tip of Mira's gok-do is coming out of the front of her abdomen. Arms trapped, all she can do is look down at it, watching as the blood pours out of her.
No, it's not blood. Pink smoke is coming out from around the edges of the blade. What? No, that's not right.
Or is it? She is a demon, after all.
Then, she hears Mira's laugh behind her. She tries to turn her head, desperate to understand, but something is keeping it in place, holding her hair tightly. A hand creeps over her shoulder, coming from behind her—pink nails flashing in the corner of her vision—Mira? No. Why would—touching her collarbone now, trailing beneath the collar of her shirt.
That's not right. Her patterns. She can't let them see her patterns. The hand trails toward her neck, leaving fire in its wake, then it's moving up up up, lifting her chin and squeezing her neck.
There's a mirror in front of her now. And there in it stands the twisted image of a demon. It looks back at her with the same shocked expression she can feel herself making. And then, underneath the marks and the horns, she sees herself. Both bound hands twisted and warped into claws, it's no wonder they have tied her up. The hand still on her throat connects to Mira standing gleefully behind her… no no this isn't right. Mira wouldn't. The blade twists in her gut. She cr—
—ies out, gasping awake. Fuck. The knife blade of pain doesn't leave her, nor the heat. She feels like she's on fire, blanket wrapped tightly around her. She can't—
She needs to—
Before she can untangle herself, a surge of nausea hits her, hard, and then she is panicking. She rolls over as close to the edge as she can, right before she gags—
no, no, please
—and then everything is pouring out of her, bile and partially digested food.
She misses the trashcan almost completely, but at least it isn't on the bed.
She pants weakly for a moment, and then—
—again and again. Each time is like a hot poker stabbing her in the side. She feels warm tears dripping down her nose.
Finally it stops. Heaving for air, she rolls onto her back, arms still pinned to her sides in her blanket. Fuck. She works one of her arms up and is able to get it free. Then the next one comes out more easily.
She thinks about trying to clean up the mess, but even the thought of doing it makes her want to cry. She weakly feels around on the other side of the bed for her phone—3 AM. At least she had gotten some sleep after taking the meds, because she isn't sure that she'll be getting more. She's never felt pain quite this bad, even with various injuries from demon hunting.
But something in her still stops her from calling Celine. She doesn't want to hear what she is almost certain Celine will say, and she just can't handle the reaction that she knows would come. So instead, she lies there, panting, covered in sweat, heart racing.
Just when she thinks she maybe can't take it anymore, that maybe she has to call Celine, or someone, or do anything else but lie here crying, as the pain builds and builds, there is a feeling of almost tearing within her—and then blessed blessed relief. Letting out a sigh, she is able to unclench her arms from around her sides and uncurl.
Maybe it was just crazy gas pain or something.
She dozes back off, much more easily this time.
But when she wakes again, there is dull pain all throughout her abdomen and she is shivering. Fuck. She had thought it was maybe over. Tears well up in her eyes. She reaches over grab the blanket and is startled to notice how swollen her stomach is.
She covers up.
She sleeps fitfully, waking again, this time hot.
She uncovers fully, but then the sweat makes her shiver, so she pulls the blanket back over.
Then, too hot.
Then, too cold.
On and off the blanket goes, maddeningly, until she has just almost found a half on and half off solution that leaves her somewhere in the middle, when she hears Mira clear her throat in the hallway, and then knock. No, it can't already be training time, is it? She checks the phone again—just after 7. Shit.
"Rumi?" Mira sounds worried and she realizes she's still just staring at the ceiling, when she needs to get up.
She calls out, "One second." Her voice is raspy—from disuse and vomiting. She clears her throat and tries again, louder. "Hold on!"
She doesn't want it to hurt again like it did earlier. Please don't let it hurt like it did when she got up earlier, again. The pain is all over her abdomen now, but when she forces herself up, it doesn't get so intense as it did before. Maybe it is a little better.
Now sat on the edge of the bed, vision swimming, she tries to take a moment to breathe, but then she hears Zoey outside the door too, and Mira talking back to her in low tones. She needs to try to hurry.
Looking down, she carefully avoids stepping in the mess and stands. Her vision goes goes white for a moment, and she clutches at the bed behind her. Fuck.
She lets go and stumbles over to the door, clumsily knocking into the wall. She ends up leaning against the wall next to the door frame, hunched over and panting. Fuck. She has never felt so exhausted.
She's not even sure if she wants to open the door. Maybe she should just talk to them through it, tell them she's sick. But then she thinks that would make them even more suspicious.
The Rumi that opens the door is not the Rumi that had told them goodnight the night before—already looking kind of unwell—and it is not a version of Rumi that Mira has ever seen. Her heart plummets into her stomach when she sees her. Zoey gasps next to her.
When they both had gone down for breakfast at their usual time for training days—6:30 AM, bleh—Rumi hadn't shown up. Knowing how tired she had been last night—and probably getting sick if you asked Mira's opinion—they had given her extra time. Mira had first expected her to rush down, apologizing. Then, she had expected her to text that she couldn't train today. Instead, they had sat there, nibbling on their breakfasts and waiting, Mira getting more anxious all the while, and Rumi hadn't done either of those things.
Finally, as the time ticked over to 7, she had stood abruptly and said, "I'm going to go check on her."
Zoey had nodded rapidly in response, saying, "Okay! I'll finish up here and take care of the dishes. I'm sure she'll be ready to go!"
Mira had highly doubted that, but hadn't said anything, not wanting to upset Zoey. So, she had walked up the stairs and stood outside Rumi's door, clearing her throat loudly and knocking. No response.
"Rumi?" She was worried then. This really wasn't like Rumi at all. Then, a weak response. She held her ear closer to the door, listening carefully.
This time, she heard part of the words, "'—old on!"
So she started preparing for the possibility of a fight, already thinking about how to convince Rumi to rest.
But then, she had continued waiting, only hearing slight sounds of movement until Zoey had had time to finish the dishes and join her outside the door. They had talked briefly before a thump sounded from next to the door and cut them off.
Mira was just about to call out again—worried—when Rumi had opened the door and shocked the both of them with her appearance.
The night before, when she had seen Rumi when they got back from their days, she had already had concerns, and dinner had just cemented that in her mind—but she had known that if she pushed Rumi about it, Rumi was much more likely to recede and clam up than to open up about it.
Looking at Rumi now, she wished she had pushed to check on her last night.
Even through the small amount she has opened the door, Mira can see several concerning things. Rumi is clearly leaning up against the wall next to the door—was that what the thump had been? She's hunched over, holding her left arm up around her stomach with her right hand still holding the door handle—the door slightly swaying.
She's sickly pale, aside from a fever flush in her cheeks, and her eyes look glazed over. Mira can see what she thinks is dried vomit on her chin, but the thing that somehow strikes her the most is that she's still in her pajamas. Not once, in all the years Mira has known her, has Rumi not at least tried to get ready on a training day, even if they or Celine could convince her to go back to bed later.
"S'rry, been sick. C'nt train t'day." The words come out of Rumi's mouth half slurred, half mumbled, Rumi breathing heavily, and Mira is more alarmed now than ever.
Rumi continues on, either not noticing their alarm or deciding to push through it, "'m okay. Just—" She gets even paler as she cuts herself off with a thick-sounding swallow, turning and lunging toward the bed—no, toward the trashcan that Mira can see now, sick on the floor surrounding it. Rumi makes it only partway before she is dropping to her knees and gagging. Shit! She rushes in after her, putting a hand on her back—burning up, even through her shirt—and, carefully, grabbing the trashcan with the other, puts it in front of Rumi, crouching down next to her.
Zoey, appearing in her peripheral, is saying something. Mira makes herself focus on it, "—at do we need? I'll go grab a thermometer and meds, but can you think of anything else?" It's so rapid, it takes Mira a moment to absorb it, before a synapse fires somewhere.
She gives Zoey a shake of her head, rubbing Rumi's back all the while.
Then Zoey is rushing out of the room, and Mira can focus in again on Rumi. She's still gagging, a painful sound, heaving up just bile now. Mira tries her best to comfort her. "Shh, let it out, Rums." Rumi sways forward on her knees, both arms wrapped around her—distended, now that Mira looks—abdomen. Mira clutches at her T-shirt to help hold her up.
"Can you try to take a breath for me?" It takes a long moment more of Rumi dry heaving and Mira soothing as best she can before Rumi is able to take in a gasping breath and rock back onto her heels, almost slumping to the side if not for Mira holding her. "Shit! Rums, can you look at me?"
It takes her a moment, but Rumi turns her head weakly, blinking up at her. "Mir? Don't feel good."
Something cracks painfully inside of her chest. "Shh, I know, jagiya. I know." The pet name slips out without her meaning for it to. Mira helps her adjust so she is leaning back against the side of the bed, sitting almost cross-legged.
Zoey is running back into the room with supplies.
"Here, Mir!" She hands over the thermometer and starts sorting other things out on the bed.
Rumi blinks slowly at Mira as Mira guides her to open her mouth so she can put the thermometer in. She smooths back the hair that is escaping Rumi's braid near her hairline, then takes a moment to check her pulse—racing, way too fast.
Zoey, finishing what she was doing, joins them on the floor, rubbing Rumi's back, while they wait for the thermometer to go off. Rumi's head lolls to the side when she turns to look at Zoey.
Mira doesn't like how confused she looks.
The thermometer beeps.
Mira's eyes go wide when she looks at it, and she curses under her breath.
"Rumi." Rumi turns her head back toward Mira "Can you tell us what's wrong?"
Rumi's brows furrow. A long moment passes, before she says, "'m okay. Just need t' sleep it off."
Mira would laugh at the absurdity if she didn't feel so concerned.
Zoey speaks up from the side, "Ruru, I don't think so. You have a really high fever. We need to get it down."
Mira nods, adding, "Yeah, this long-sleeved shirt definitely isn't helping. Can we take it off, Rums?"
As soon as that is out of her mouth, Rumi's trying to scoot away from them, whining. A small amount of clarity enters her eyes, as she says, "No, no no no. Can't"
Mira swallows the angry response that wants to come out. That this isn't the time for modesty! But that wouldn't be helpful to say, and she knows that underneath it is fear—fear that has been slowly growing in the back of her mind as long as she's known Rumi. Every wardrobe change and outfit that had covered more of her arms had only added to the theory that she doesn't want to believe.
But now, looking at Rumi, desperately trying to get away from them at the mere mention of them taking her shirt off—blocked only by the bed behind her and the weakness of her body—she is more afraid of that idea than she ever has been.
"Rumi, we just need to lower your temperature. I promise we aren't going to judge whatever is under your sleeves, okay?" She does her best to aim for reassurance.
"No, can't. Not s'ppos'd to." She's shaking her head weakly back and forth. Not supposed to? What does that mean?
"What do you mean, Ruru?" Zoey now, speaking so gently.
"No no. Can't let you see." Mira doubts that Rumi would be saying even that much if she wasn't so clearly delirious. She pushes the frustration down. Rumi's eyes are closed, but she keeps shaking her head slowly, the refusal still radiating off of her.
Okay, this clearly isn't going to work. She tries to think of a solution. Work smarter, not harder.
She catches Zoey's eye and mouths 'go with this'.
"Okay, Rums." She waits for Rumi to open her eyes and look at her, trying to catch as much of her attention as she can. "Okay, we won't." It's not worth stressing Rumi out so much to have her panicking as Mira tries to figure out what to do. That must give Rumi some relief; she sighs and sags back onto the side of the bed behind her, some of the tension leaving her body.
"But we need you to take some meds then. We really need to lower your temp." Rumi groans and holds her stomach tighter, shaking her head again. Mira keeps speaking, "We need to, Rums. Can you try to take some for us? I know you don't want to get sick." Rumi looks up at her with teary eyes, but nods her head.
Zoey is already back up and grabbing some fever reducers and water from where she had set them down.
"I'll be back in a few minutes. I need to check something." Then, lower, toward Zoey, "You okay on your own?"
Zoey nods, searching her eyes. Rumi is focused on the medication that Zoey has handed her, so Zoey holds up a hand to her mouth and ear, mouthing the word 'phone?'. Mira nods.
She walks out briskly, fighting against every instinct to stay when Rumi weakly calls her name, but she has something she needs to do.
Thankfully, she hears Zoey comforting her, helping her swallow some water with the medicine.
She starts dialing Celine's number and heads toward the living room. She doesn't want Rumi to overhear her call. She's already anticipating anger, 'not s'pp'sed to' still ringing in her ears. It has been since she heard it. She knows she could be wrong, but she also knows that Rumi has grown up hearing 'your faults and fears must never be seen.'
It's not that she thinks Celine doesn't care. She's never thought that, but she certainly hasn't always agreed with her choices.
(Foremost of all, she remembers when she had gone to Celine, younger and not naive—no chance of that with her upbringing—but maybe more trusting of the woman that had taken her away from the life she had been living, and she had told her about her concerns. The way Rumi was hiding more of her body. The way she sometimes looked like she wanted so desperately to go with them to the bathhouse, but always said no anyway. She had walked away from the conversation, angry and disbelieving, with Celine's words about modestly repeating in her head.)
Celine answers as she steps down from the last step.
"Mira? Did something happen?"
She doesn't speak at first, still thinking of what to say.
"Mira? Mira, is Rumi okay?" She knows it's wrong of her, but it feels a little satisfying to have Celine feel some of the concern she has had to feel.
She waits one moment more, hearing the shaky inhale on Celine's side of the phone, before, "No. She's sick, like really sick, and she won't let us take off her long sleeves. She said something about not being supposed to."
She waits, hearing Celine sigh heavily and then respond. "Sick how? Should I call a private doctor?"
"Like really sick, Celine. Like I think she needs the hospital, sick."
Celine inhales sharply, lowly, but Mira hears it.
"Are you just going to ignore what I said about her shirt? Celine, this isn't the time for modesty or whatever you are both hiding. Like I'm worried about her brain, the fever is so high. We need to be able to do whatever we can."
A long moment of waiting.
Mira clenches her teeth. What the fuck can be so important to Celine that it's more important than Rumi? Just as she is about to speak again, angrily, Celine replies. "I'm on my way. I'm in Seoul today. I'll be there soon, and I'll call the private doctor. Can you… Can you wait that long?"
Eyes narrowed as she looks out over the city, Mira begrudgingly agrees.
She storms back up the stairs, angry.
She's almost back at Rumi's door when she hears her cry out. She runs, skidding through the doorway. Zoey is helping Rumi get on the bed, Rumi lying back, panting weakly, feebly. She doesn't know if it's in her head or if Rumi actually looks worse than she did even a few minutes ago. "What happened?"
Zoey looks back at her, a tear running down her face, "I accidentally touched her stomach." Then, turning toward Rumi, "Shhh, I'm sorry, Rums. I'm so sorry." She is rubbing Rumi's hand. Rumi whines, curling around herself, panting into the pillow. Mira doesn't think she's hearing them.
"Mira, I'm really worried. This seems… bad. What did she say?"
"That she's on her way, and she is calling the private doctor. Did she keep the meds down?"
"Yeah, for now."
Rumi somehow falls into a fitful sleep, or maybe just passes out. Mira isn't sure.
They dim the lights and step out into the hallway—leaving the door open. Mira turns to speak to Zoey, but when she sees the look on her face, she opens her arms wide and then Zoey is barrelling into her. "Oof." She wraps her arms tightly around Zoey, hearing the muffled sob and feeling the tears soak through her shirt as Zoey presses her face into Mira's shoulder. "I know Zo, I know."
They hug for a long moment, before they step back from each other. Mira can feel her own eyes welling up with tears, but she wipes at her face and pushes the feeling back down.
"She wasn't nearly so bad yesterday. I wish we knew what was going on—if we should be rushing her to the hospital. I don't know, Zoey, something feels really wrong."
Zoey nods, eyes still glistening. "I know." She wipes below her nose with her sleeve. "I know. It feels really off to me too, but hopefully those meds will help and hopefully the doctor can help too. Did Celine say anything else?"
Mira growls, "Just 'can we wait for her to get here?' basically. I hate this. I hate feeling like she wouldn't react the same way if it was one of us lying here, burning up with fever." She realizes she is clenching her hands and consciously tries to relax them, forcing herself to take a deep breath.
Zoey takes one of her hands, rubbing it gently.
Mira wants to say more, but at that moment a whimper comes from the bed.
Rumi is where they left her, still asleep, but writhing on the bed.
Shit.
Mira puts a hand to her forehead—shit—even hotter now, and Rumi startles awake with a desperate cry, holding her stomach.
Mira recoils reflexively—Rumi's left eye is that of a demon, and now that she's looking, she can see a familiar magenta glow creeping out from underneath Rumi's shirt collar. A large part of her is screaming to summon her blade. She feels her fingers itching to hold a handle that she doesn't let manifest.
She's knows it's Rumi in front of her—trembling and scared. And if Rumi has made a deal, well, they'll figure that out later. Right now, looking into eyes cloudy with fever, even if one of them is golden, all she can decide to do is offer comfort.
She looks over and locks eyes with a shocked Zoey, but she sees the determination fill Zoey's eyes and together, they nod.
Zoey doesn't understand what she's seeing, but right now, she doesn't really care. Rumi—she knows it's Rumi—is in front of them in desperate, screaming pain, unable to care for herself. And she will not abandon her friend—to this illness or to a deal with Gwi-Ma. Whatever this is, they will figure it out later.
But right now—
"We can't wait any longer. I don't care what Celine says." Mira, as always, is in agreement with her without an exchange of words. "I'm sorry, Rums." Mira scoops her up carefully, but quickly.
Rumi is sobbing, crying out, "No, no. Mir. It hurts." Tears are running down her face.
Zoey rushes down the stairs ahead of them, knowing Mira will be quick and careful.
They are hurrying toward the elevator when it opens with a ding.
A neutral-faced Celine is standing there, until her eyes land on Rumi in Mira's arms—her expression quickly morphing into shock as she speaks, "I… I didn't expect it to be so bad."
"Because I'm so prone to exaggeration? I said that she was very sick, Celine." Mira's voice is quiet, but Zoey can hear that it's tight with anger. Rumi had passed out again on the way down—from pain? from the fever? Zoey doesn't know, but she's not going to let them get in the way of getting Rumi help, by arguing.
"We don't have time for this. Rumi needs the hospital, Celine. Whatever it is you were hiding, both of you—"
She cuts herself off. She doesn't know for sure that it is the same thing as Rumi's demon eye, and the patterns inching up her neck. Can they trust Celine around Rumi if she has made a deal?
But it's already too late to stop the collision from happening.
In that moment, Rumi comes awake in Mira's arms with a groan.
From Mira's arms, Rumi, looking at Celine, weakly says, "Cece, 'm sorry. 'm sorry. Tried not to."
Something on Celine's face cracks open, as she steps closer toward Rumi. Zoey wants to step in front of her, but she's already looking right at Rumi. It must be that she knows about this. There's no surprise there on her face, just something like grief or heartbreak.
Zoey holds her arm out as the elevator doors try to close, keeping them open and ready.
Celine replies as she takes another step, "No, gongjunim." Zoey is caught off guard by the nickname—one she hasn't ever heard Celine use. Celine steps closer, putting a hand on Rumi's forehead, continuing to speak. "I thought something was wrong yesterday. I… I shouldn't have ignored it just because you said you were okay."
Rumi sighs, her eyes rolling around in their sockets.
She's so limp in Mira's arms.
Zoey swallows down a rush of nausea.
Mira speaks then. "Listen, I would really like to understand what is happening here, but can we get a move on? Medical emergency and all."
Celine looks up at them with a start. "She didn't… you don't know?"
"All we know is that Rumi is clearly in need of help. I'm not going to let whatever this is—" She nods down towards Rumi's face. "—stop me from helping her. But again, later, I will want to know what's going on."
Something seems to click then, and then Celine is spinning around to lead the way back into the elevator, Zoey's arm still holding it open and ready for them.
They squeeze into the elevator. Zoey can see Mira's jaw clenching even tighter.
Celine is already texting rapidly on her phone, muttering something about 'the driver'. Zoey squeezes herself into a corner so that Mira can comfortably hold Rumi.
Zoey is doing her best to keep her breathing from speeding up, staring at one of the top corners of the elevator. The tension is thick in the air—she hates the feeling, so similar to that of her childhood—before a whimper breaks through it.
And then she is rushing to comfort Rumi, letting herself take up space in order to reach Rumi's head. She brushes the hair back on Rumi's forehead—shit, her temperature feels so high. Zoey looks up at Mira, seeing worry reflecting down at her from Mira's face, through her glasses. She looks at Rumi, Rumi trying to focus her gaze, but Zoey isn't sure how much of her she is seeing. Then, her face goes slack, and she's out again.
A cheerful ding breaks the silence—Zoey finds herself irrationally angry at it—and the elevator opens to the private parking garage.
The driver—Celine had called hers back—is approaching in a sleek black vehicle.
Zoey jumps in the back seat, helping Mira maneuver Rumi onto the seat—god, she's so limp. Zoey has to swallow down tears, and then Mira is sliding into the seat opposite them. Celine sits next to her, barking orders into the front of the car—through the driver's window.
The rest of the ride is a blur. Zoey can only focus on Rumi's head in her lap and how terrible she looks. Then, the car is stopping at the ambulance bay, and workers from the hospital—Celine had called ahead?—are getting Rumi out of the car and onto a gurney, working quickly.
All they can do is blindly follow after her as the medical team works on her.
Then, there is someone standing in the way of them, blocking them from following Rumi. She can hear Mira arguing to her left, but it feels far away behind the ringing in her ears.
Celine standing behind her, puts a hand on her shoulder, leading her—
—
—Zoey comes back to herself seated at a table, Mira next to her—clutching her hand—and Celine across from them, lines tight on her face.
There are drinks in front of all three of them. She blinks down at hers, confused.
Mira squeezes her hand, looking at her worriedly. Oh no, she hadn't wanted to worry anyone. They have enough to be worrying about.
"You back with us, Zo?"
She picks up the drink shakily and takes a long swallow, nodding her head. "Sorry."
The grip on her hand gets tighter, as Mira shakes her head gently. Then she seems to remember something and her face sharpens as she turns to Celine.
"Are you going to tell us what's going on now? Rumi. She… One of her eyes, it was golden, like a demon. It didn't seem to surprise you." The last word lancing through the air like the blade of Mira's gok-do.
Celine takes a long moment, evaluating them carefully. "Is that all you saw?"
"You realize that tells us that there was more to see, right?"
Zoey's head swivels back and forth between them—once again, reminded far too much of a certain time in her life.
"Yes, I know. I just…"
It's so rare to see Celine hesitate.
"I'm trying to understand what you saw, and… and how you didn't…"
"Didn't what?" She squeezes Mira's hand more firmly now, trying to keep her grounded. There is a deadly edge in her voice.
"Well, to be quite honest, I thought that you would have killed or attacked Rumi at seeing signs of a demon."
Mira is up and out of her chair before Celine can even finish—the chair legs scraping roughly against the floor. Zoey clutches her hand, trying to keep her from doing something rash, as Mira spits angrily, "You mean if we had done the things that you trained us to do?"
Zoey is glad they seem to be in a private room as she looks around. This would certainly draw some attention.
She's mad too, but she needs to keep calm for Rumi's sake.
"Mir…" Mira looks down at her, eyes burning. "Mir, we need to focus on Rumi. She needs us." Mira glowers at Celine a moment longer, looming. Celine sits in her chair, hands folded together on the table in front of her, calm as ever—then, tension in the room only slightly dropping, Mira almost collapses back into her chair.
"Tell us what the fuck you mean, Celine. I would never attack Rumi, especially not when she's probably dying in front of me, marks and golden eye and all."
Celine swallows heavily and says, "I'm beginning to see that. I will admit that I may have grossly miscalculated. I… I will need to apologize to Rumi and to both of you, but first, let me explain."
She tells them the whole sordid affair. A literal affair between a hunter and a demon. A pregnancy scandal that had rocked the world. A pregnancy that, as it continued, seemed to weaken Mi-yeong more and more each day. But at the heart of it all, a mother, who cared more for her unborn child than herself. 'Promise me, Celine. Promise me that you will take care of her.'
And then, a child, born with a single purple line on her upper arm—a single line that had grown to spread and encompass so much of her that each year she had to hide more and more.
Zoey is shocked, and next to her, she can see that Mira is, as well.
Mira is seemingly about to say something when there is a knock at the door. A voice speaks through it to them, "For Rumi-nim? We have an update."
"Come in."
They sit up at full attention, swiveling toward the door.
A young woman walks in the room, dressed in scrubs. She is holding a clipboard with some papers.
She steps in, carefully looking at the hallway behind her before she shuts the door, and then she approaches the table like she is approaching a pack of wild animals.
"How... how is she?" Celine's voice is shaky in a way that Zoey didn't expect.
Zoey realizes that she doesn't even know how long it's been since they got here—how long she had been out of it.
The woman explains to them—that Rumi's appendix has burst, and too long ago at that, and that they will be opening her up to clean her out. Zoey almost finds herself lost again even as Mira speaks. "Can we… can we see her first?"
"We do need to take her for surgery very quickly, but we can have two people come in to the room for a few minutes."
Before they can even say anything, Celine is waving at them to go with the woman. She has a sheen of tears on her eyes that Zoey does her best to ignore.
They follow the woman quickly.
She looks so small, on the bed, connected to different machines. She's unconscious.
Zoey had hoped they might be able to speak to her briefly, but she's also glad that Rumi isn't in pain.
She finds herself sitting next to her, holding her hand as Mira talks to the medical professional.
She tries to listen, but it's like her brain is filtering it out.
"What did you say is going to happen?"
"We will clean out the inside of her abdomen, then she will have to be on strong IV antibiotics. Hopefully that will clear up this infection. We don't know how it will react with her unique physiology."
The reminder that it was easier for Celine to tell a team of doctors than them nags at Mira. She can't believe that Celine had thought them so untrustworthy as to not tell them something like this.
She shudders to think of what could have happened if they had found out in a situation when Rumi wasn't in front of them, pale and sick, clearly needing them. She—she wants to think that she would have been able to handle it, but she can think of plenty of scenarios where it could have endangered Rumi.
Most of all, she just doesn't understand why Rumi didn't trust them.
She looks over at Rumi on the bed, looking so unlike the leader she is used to following into battle and onto the stage.
Most stark are the patterns wrapping their way up her arms and visible on her neck—exposed by the gown they have put her in. Mira is glad she had time to prepare. Even walking in ready to see it, the instinct to draw her weapon still signals in the back of her mind.
She swallows down the sob that wants to leave her. She needs to stay strong.
Then, the nurse is telling them that they need to go soon—that the surgeon is almost ready. She takes a moment to step over to Rumi's bedside and tell her, "I love you, Rums. We will see you when they get done, okay?" She can't let herself consider an alternative. She won't.
She walks around to the other side of the bed, to where Zoey is sitting, pale-faced, murmuring at Rumi.
"Zo. Zo, we have to go now. They are gonna help her, okay?"
It takes a moment, but then Zoey looks up at her with wide eyes and nods. Mira is glad she seems to still be here in the moment. It didn't happen often, but it was always scary to see when Zoey would dissociate like she had earlier. They clasp hands again, and follow the nurse back down the hallway, to wait.
She is ready to finish hearing what Celine has to say.
Rumi can't remember what she was doing when she went to sleep, but she wakes to a disconcerting beeping near her head. What is that? She feels strange, floaty, like the one time that Zoey and Mira had convinced her to try weed with them—brought back by Zoey on their private jet from a trip to visit her family.
The more she starts to notice, the stranger she feels. A cottony feeling in her mouth registers next, then the strange texture underneath her fingers—not the expensive sheets they have at the penthouse.
Then, a pressure on her inner elbow.
Then, a strange feeling over much of her abdomen, almost like pain, but feeling somewhere far away from her.
Then, finally, as she tries to open her eyes, a glaringly white ceiling looking down at her. She groans, shutting her eyes again.
Twin calls ring out, stopping their quiet conversation, "Rumi?"
She scrunches her eyebrows, thinking—those voices sounded familiar.
"Rumi, can you hear us?" Closer now.
She goes to reply, but her throat refuses to send words past the desert in her mouth.
All that comes out is a scratchy-sounding groan.
"Hold on, Rums." This time she hears the footsteps and then, one of the voices—it makes her think of the color pink and the smell of cloves and vanilla—speaks again, even closer, "Here, can you take a sip?" Then she feels a straw being help up to her closed lips. She opens her mouth and they push the straw in. "Slowly."
She tries to listen. The rush of water feels heavenly on her throat and she can't help but swallow greedily, until it's pulled away—she whines.
"I know, Rums." The other voice, the one that reminds her of trees in the spring and the sound of humming. "Can you open your eyes for us?"
Right, she had forgotten about that. She tries again. They have dimmed the lights halfway, so it feels easier on her eyes this time.
She opens them. Two faces are standing over her, one on either side. They are both looking worriedly down. She slowly blinks at them—these beautiful women she knows but doesn't quite recognize—before she looks down at her body.
No.
No.
These marks—she can't remember why right now, but she knows that no one is supposed to see them. She can't—the women aren't supposed to see this. They only get closer as her breathing starts to pick up speed, the monitor beeping more rapidly. One of them turns and starts talking to—another person? Some kind of nurse.
No. She can't let all these people see. She—she needs to—
Please please
—the feeling of desperation is filling up within her—
she—
she can't—
she can't breathe—
she is trying, please—
—something pulls in her chest—
—her ears pop—
—and she—
—she's—
—gone