Work Text:
“WHY?!”
Rumi jerks back as the honmoon ripples. Her breath catches, then rushes out as she watches the colors shift from comforting blue to a sickening fuchsia. A demonic color. The same color that alerts them to the honmoon being breached, only this time, Rumi stands at the epicenter.
Rumi is the demon that hurt the honmoon.
She falls back onto her butt, hands braced out behind her as she breathes heavily, eyes desperately running along the lines she’s been able to see her whole life. Lines she’s always been able to reach out and touch, playing with the ropes of light like they were strings on a guitar and watching in fascination as the vibrations trembled and lit up along them.
She’s never hurt it before.
The city is the same as a moment before. The honmoon still blankets it. Calm, soft blue. The ripple she had caused petered out far off in the distance. Like nothing had happened at all. Everything is fine.
But she hurt it. She managed to hurt it.
Demon.
She flinches again, hand curling around the bars of the grate at the edge of the roof. Her nails bite into the shiny metal, scraping. No, not nails- claws.
She immediately releases her hold when she realizes, afraid of hurting anything else.
The first time her claws came out, she was seven. She was a year into training and old enough for Celine to up the tempo of their spars. They’d been genuinely sparing for a week. Duck, spin, dodge, return strike, weave.
Rumi was small, and didn’t have a lot of strength yet, but she was fast, and she was determined. Celine, in contrast, had been fighting for years before Rumi was even born, and even with all her determination, Rumi hadn’t been able to get a single hit.
Rumi had been hit, though. A sting in her ankle as it’s yanked out from underneath her, a hard swat to her ribs when she opened her guard. It was all functional. Controlled. Clinical as Celine gave directions while Rumi did her best to hit her with a sword and Celine merely stepped around her.
And then Rumi made a mistake. She attacked instead of dodging, desperate to just get one touch- show Celine that she’d be the best hunter- and the wooden practice sword came down hard against her arm.
Pain lanced through her, hot and immediate, and she yelped, reflexively dropping her sword as she crumpled to the ground. Somewhere past the ringing in ears, her mentor cursed.
Tears squeezed out of Rumi’s clenched eyes as she curled around the hurt, brain white with static and pain. She didn’t really process her mentor kneeling at her side. She was frustrated and angry at herself, but when she felt a hand on her shoulder trying to turn her over, that anger sharpened and snapped.
She snarled, twisting and lashing out. Three thin lines of red opened up on Celine’s arm, as she lifted it to block her face. Her face showed surprise. Then shifted into fear. Starlight leapt into her hand on instinct as she launched herself to her feet, and away.
Her stance was no longer the calm, casual confidence she displayed previously, but planted and ready. Bracing.
For a moment, they just stared at each other with wide eyes. Rumi couldn’t stop looking at the cuts she had opened up, then the real blades pointed at her, and fear crashed in even harder.
She fell backward, clawed hand moving to grip her hurt arm as a sob rocked through her. “Eomma… Eomma, I’m sorry. Please, I’m sorry,” she cried.
Celine just stared at her, conflict written in her eyes, written in the slight dip of her sword, and Rumi screamed, hugging herself and kicking at the dirt petulantly with tears and snot running down her face. Finally, Celine‘s starlight weapon dipped even further, “Just- just breathe, Rumi. Take a deep breath.” But she didn’t dismiss her weapon entirely, and Rumi’s patterns seared a crawling trail across her arm. She could feel them expanding, splitting her skin open, spreading farther than they ever have at once before.
She wailed with the pain and panic. She didn’t know what was happening.
It took a long time for Rumi to calm down. She tried, she tried so hard. She didn’t want to be a monster. She didn’t want Céline to kill her. She wanted to be held, and to be told everything was going to be okay.
She wanted to be normal.
But her guardian didn’t come to her, even when she reached out for her with blurry eyes and purple tipped nails. She kept her distance. Ready. Watching. She told Rumi to calm, so Rumi tried her very hardest to force the sobs down along with the fear and pain. Her arm still hurt from where Celine had hit her, but that was the farthest thing from her mind.
Eventually, Rumi managed to stop crying. She managed to calm herself as long as she didn't look toward her mentor with her starlight weapons. And eventually, the tiny needle-like claws growing from her fingertips receded into her normal fingernails.
Only then did Celine drop to her knees beside her and haul her into a hug. Rumi felt numb as her Eomma - in all but blood - pressed her damp dirt, teary, snot-smudged face into her shoulder. Celine was shaking as she ran her hand down Rumi’s braid.
“Good, good,” she murmured. “Control. You have to control it, Rumi. You aren’t like everyone else. You can’t get angry, can’t lash out. Your faults and fears must never be seen. Otherwise you will be controlled by them, and I’ll lose you.”
Because Rumi was a demon. She was a hunter - or would be - but she was a demon, too. And if she couldn’t control her demon side, Celine would have to kill her. Because hunters killed demons.
She was seven when she realized that, one day, Celine might have to kill her.
She grew claws a handful more times before she turned 10. Always when she was hurt and scared, or angry. Always when her emotions got so big that she was unable to hide them.
Celine always reinforced that she must hide them. She had to, she had to, she had to.
Eventually, she got good at shutting them down and away. Sinking into the emotions and past it until they didn’t even register anymore, while the world became more and less in the same drowning moment. There, just- fractured by some insurmountable degree of separation. Her body stopped betraying her by shifting shape, but her patterns kept spreading.
Celine’s fear never faded, no matter how well she hid it. Rumi could tell. She could see it in the tightening of her hand around her weapon. In her assessing stare as Rumi calmly went through her drills each morning. In her flinch as Rumi landed her first actually solid hit against her- that brief flash of regret, like she saw the premonition of a future where Rumi would be much harder to put down if the need ever arose.
When she summoned her sain-geom at eleven, Rumi hadn't lost control for a whole year, and she felt like maybe, finally, she could be just a hunter.
Maybe her fate wasn’t already inevitable. She could be good. She could seal the honmoon and fix herself. Then maybe Celine wouldn’t be afraid of her anymore.
It’s been 14 years since she last saw her claws. They aren’t tiny little needles anymore. They are hard and sharp, jutting almost an inch past her purple-gray fingers. The once soft pads of her fingers are hard, like bone.
They tremble, held out in front of her. She pants, trying to wrestle control.
Control, control, control.
She hurt the honmoon. Her voice hurt the honmoon. Not even demons can do that.
Monster.
She clenches her eyes shut. One of them is burning. Sharpening and blurring as it tries to shift into something unnatural.
No, no. Control. She can’t let it win. Push it down. Breathe. Mira and Zoey must be wondering where she went. Will they come looking for her? Would they even be able to find her? They can’t see her like this.
She gnashes her teeth in frustration. Her fangs are too big for her mouth, her tongue slow and clumsy in the changed space. She tastes copper.
She didn’t mean to.
Fuck. Fuck.
What is happening to her? Her voice… the one thing that kept her from being more than just a demon… What if- what if it’s too late?
What if she actually loses her senses, loses herself? Celine knew what she was. She could protect herself and do what needed to be done, but her other hunters don’t know.
She tricked them into thinking she was normal. Like them. If she snaps, they’d be caught totally unaware.
The realization dawns on her slowly as she blinks open her divergent eyes and stares down at her demonic hands. It's slow and slinking. It's heavy as it seeps under her skin and turns her blood to oil.
She has to tell them, she realizes.
Her faults and fears must never be seen. But if she loses control, they need to know. They need to be ready to stop her.
These thoughts are what finally drags forth that numbing blanket that settles around her. Her personal honmoon that pushes Rumi further down, under her skin.
She can picture it now. Them learning what she is. Reaching for the honmoon, like they should. Maybe they wouldn’t wait to see if she would wrestle back control, like Celine did. Maybe they’ll strike before she can.
Maybe that would be better.
Her voice… if the demon in her stole her voice… how can she ever fix herself, now?
She can feel it burning, tightening around her throat. Her patterns aren’t just surface level. She can’t cut them out (she tried that ages ago). They reach deep into her muscles, an imprint against her bone, like a bruise that will never go away.
With that distant, detached blanket smothering her, she debates what to do. She could go to Celine. She’d know what to do. Know if there’s nothing else to be done. She would make it quick if there’s not.
She could crawl to the edge of the building again. Just tilt over and let gravity take her.
The idea makes her claws tremble, somewhere beyond the numb. She doesn’t want to die.
But she can’t see any other way that this ends.
The cold wind cuts into Rumi’s bare arms, making her shiver. It’s such a foreign feeling- air on her arms. It’s not allowed. She knows she’s breaking the rules.
She should reach for her jacket. Get control. Bury it.
She doesn’t.
Her eye stops burning. The rooftop is just dark, except for the honmoon and the city down below. The Live should have started ages ago. Are they still waiting for her to return? What would they do if she just doesn’t?
She’s been sitting here a while. It’s never taken so long to get her hand back.
She flexes it, looking at the odd shape it takes. Her fingers are too long. Her skin is wrong. It’s not her hand. She’s very sure that it’s not hers. But it reacts when she moves it, half a second behind her brain. Slightly lagging.
It’s not hers.
It’s not hers.
She thinks about cutting it off. She can’t have claws if she doesn’t have a hand. She curls the wrong-looking fingers and presses the tips of the demon claws into the purple-grey palm. She keeps pressing, and red wells up under the sharp points.
She stops.
Not because it hurts, but because demons don’t bleed.
It’s not too late. It can’t be too late.
Rumi stands on stiff, aching legs and reaches for her jacket. She pulls it on, fastening the neck all the way up. It feels like a noose. Like a hand. Her hand.
Her claws wrap loosely around her neck, a threat. Her human arm wraps around her waist, a facsimile to a hug.
Then she turns to the stairs that will take her down to the penthouse.
It’s been hours now. They had to have cancelled by now and sent everyone home. She doesn’t know what she expects when the elevator doors open for her.
Maybe anger for her abrupt disappearance. Maybe an empty room as the others have already gone to bed.
But the concern on Mira and Zoey’s faces as they stand from the couch, clearly waiting for her, feels somehow wrong.
She shifts her demonic hand under her crossed arms as they come forward, and Mira places a hand on her shoulder.
They don’t immediately ask what happened. Mira just says, “Come on, go get changed. Then let’s eat something. I made soup,” and guides her to her room.
When she emerges, they are still waiting for her, and Rumi takes the spot across from them at the table. She can’t help noticing - always noticing - how far apart she is from them. How they’re so close their knees touch under the table, but Rumi is… not.
She traces her spoon around the rim of her bowl, watching the seaweed swirl. She uses her human hand. Her claws are carefully tucked into her lap, sweatshirt sleeves bunched over her knuckles. She doesn’t think it’s going to change back. She won’t be able to hide them forever.
“I-“ her voice catches, like it had when trying to sing. It feels raw and breaks again when she forces more words out. “I need help.”
Mira and Zoey exchange looks over her head, before both are dropping their own spoons and scooting their chairs around the table while reaching for her.
She can’t help wincing as Zoey’s hand covers hers, and Mira’s lands on her covered forearm.
“Of course. Anything.” Zoey says eagerly, relief plain in her voice. Relief that Rumi is asking for help. Relief that she can do something to make it better.
“What’s going on, Rumi?” Mira counters seriously, no less willing and resolved.
“I ran out of time.” It comes out so sad. So lost. Empty. Her eyelids flutter in resignation. She thought she had more time.
They exchange another look. “Time?” Mira asks gently. “For what?”
“To fix it. Fix… me.”
“I don’t understand,” Zoey says, apologetically, sweeping her thumb across her knuckles.
Mira scoots closer again, touch becoming more solid as she presses her entire palm against her arm. She squeezes gently. “Rumi, we can’t help if you don’t talk to us.”
She’s trying. She just- doesn’t know how. It’s like her throat is being squeezed and won’t let her. Is it the demon trying to survive? Because it knows that once they know it’s there, they will kill it? Or is it just her, still selfishly wanting to hold onto them- for them not to look at her like Celine does? Distrust. Trepidation. Like a mistake she doesn’t know how to correct.
“You’ll hate me,” Rumi intones, vision narrowing further, until all she can see is the swirling soup, tone becoming flatter until there is nothing to feel at all.
Demons don’t feel, right? Is this it?
“Never,” Mira growls, hand moving up to grip her shoulder tightly. It presses on her patterns. It aches like a bruise, but they are old aches and she’s used to it.
“I’ve been lying to you.”
Mira’s grip falters, her encouraging smile wavering. Then her hold tightens again, and her lips press into a thin, resolved line. “Okay. But you’re about to tell us the truth.”
“Yes,” she agrees. “But you’ll hate me,” she warns again.
“Never,” Mira says again, too.
“Come on, Rumi,” Zoey says nervously, shifting back and forth in her chair, “you’re scaring us.”
“I’m a demon.”
A beat passes. The hands on her recoil.
Rumi frowns, hating that something in her aches, even though it’s expected. “Half-demon,” she corrects. “But I don’t know if I… I don’t know if that matters anymore, now that it’s taken my voice.”
Another several seconds pass like a held breath. “…What?”
Rumi lifts her eyes. Feels them flicker- contract, then revert. She’s so tired.
Mira stares at her with wide eyes. Zoey too.
But they don’t spring from their chairs. They don’t reach for their weapons. Rumi’s brow furrows in confusion. Why don’t they reach for their weapons?
Rumi reaches slowly up with a clawed finger- and they instantly lock on the malformed appendage- hooks it into the collar of her turtle neck, and drags it down.
“I’ve had patterns since the day I was born. They started spreading when I was four. Just a little bit. Then a lot. The- the other features started happening when I was a bit older. When I was angry. Scared. Celine said I had to keep it hidden. Control it. But I don’t know that I can anymore. And if I can’t control it- if I snap…. I don’t want to hurt anyone. I don’t want to hurt either of you. So you need to know. And you need to be ready for if…”
Rumi flinches as something brushes over the back of her hand. Then nearly leaps from the chair as another touch brushes the skin of her neck, just above her claws.
It lingers for a moment, and Rumi traces it up to Mira’s face, whose gaze is locked on her own fingers over purple brands, brow furrowed and hesitant. No one has ever touched her patterns before. Even she avoids touching them, unless it’s to dig her nails into them in bouts of hatred.
But then the girl withdraws, attention flicking up to meet Rumi’s. “What exactly are you asking us to do, Rumi,” she asks, expression turning hard and narrow.
“Stop me,” Rumi blurts instantly. “If I lose it, I need you to be prepared to end it- end me- if I can’t.”
Zoey lets out a soft gasp, hands lifting from where she’d started petting Rumi’s hand again, to her mouth.
Mira’s eyes don’t leave her as she says firmly, without hesitation or a single considering thought, “No.”
Rumi’s jaw drops. She cringes as Mira finally leaps to her feet, but it’s not to put distance between them. Her hand snaps out to grab Rumi’s chin, yanking it up from where it starts to dip defensively to her chest, and toward her, forcing her to meet her eyes.
“No, Rumi, what the fuck?” She growls. “How could you ask us that?”
“I’m-“ Rumi’s eyebrows crease unhappily, a bubble of upset and grief seeping into her spine, past the emptiness she had hoped and clawed for- and hated all the while. She didn’t expect this. Didn’t expect Mira to argue- honestly didn’t expect to get past the first glimpse of her patterns.
Did she want that? For them to kill her on sight? No, she doesn’t think so. So why does this reaction feel so wrong?
“Rumi, we would never hurt you,” Zoey says emphatically, reaching out to try and hug Rumi, but she shies away- like they should be, jolting backward off her stool and almost falling.
It pulls her chin out of Mira’s grip, a touch that, even angry, is no different from if she were correcting their forms in dance practice. Merely firm, a gentle demand.
“But I need you to,” Rumi sputters out desperately. “Please. There’s no- no precedent for what this means. Being a half-demon. I-it’s never taken this long,” she holds up her clawed hand, too long, too sharp- not hers. “What if I can’t change it back? What if the more my patterns spread, the more demonic I become inside, too? What if I hurt you? I don’t want to hurt you.”
“Then don’t ask us to put you down like you’re a damned dog,” Mira snaps.
“Mira,” Zoey warns, voice wobbly.
Mira’s glare flickers to her, then pinches further in frustration as she groans, shoving her hands roughly through her hair. “Right. Fuck. Okay.”
She sighs, slumping back into her stool and turning steady eyes back on Rumi. The anger is still there, but it’s simmering rather than raging. “Just so it’s very clear, we’re not going to do- that. We’re not going to kill you, Rumi. Ever.” She takes a deep breath, eyes closing and hands lifting in an imitation of Bobby when he’s overwhelmed and trying to recenter himself.
“But you’re worried about losing control,” she continues. “So, fine. Your worries are valid concerns and-“ her face twists, and her eyes fly open, locking on Rumi. The calm dissipates again in an instant. “Well, no actually, you know what? It’s not valid. Have you ever actually hurt someone- and I’m talking not during a spar?”
Shame crawling through her burning, pulsing patterns, Rumi dips her head. “Celine,” she admits quietly.
Mira jolts in genuine surprise, eyebrows shooting up. “Oh, shit, you managed to get one over on her? Nice.”
The reaction startles Rumi, and a wave of disbelief and grief quickly overwhelms her chest as she realizes they really aren’t taking this seriously. “Not nice! I broke my arm while we were training, and she was just trying to help me, and I attacked her! I scratched her! This is why you need to know- so that if I lose it, you won’t be caught off guard like she was. It might have been manageable back then, but I’m an adult now, and if I can’t control it anymore, I could do some real damage before anyone even realizes what’s happening!”
Mira and Zoey exchange glances. “Rumi… how old were you?” Zoey starts.
“And how exactly did Celine handle it whenever your claws came out?”
“I-“ Rumi rocks back, chest heaving. This isn’t going how she thought it would. Why aren’t they scared? “Seven. We usually just- waited it out. Celine would watch over me until we were sure I could get back control.” Rumi collapses back into the seat, burying her face in her hands. “I thought I had it under control… But then… We were so close.” Her voice breaks and crackles out.
Hands come into contact on either side of her body. They are soft, steady. More than she deserves, but they are so comforting and it makes her body slump forward, helpless to resist when she wants that comfort so badly.
Someone’s hand cards through hair, collecting the flyaways and soothing them down. She doesn’t know who’s. All she knows is that it is gentle, and it is kind, and that she loves them.
“Rumi…” Zoey croons mournfully. She lets out a quiet, resigned, breath. “Okay, we’ll be careful,” she agrees softly, ever the people pleaser. Then her tone shifts. “But that’s all we are agreeing to. If you go full demon rampage or something, and start trying to eat people’s souls, we’ll just have to tie you up somewhere until we can find a way to reach you and get you back.” A finger jabs her in the chest. “Because we will get you back.”
“But, honestly, Nae Sarang,” Rumi’s breath catches at the name, and then further as a hand slowly slides into hers. Into the demonic one. Soft fingers trace so gently over her discolored knuckles, and she reflexively clamps down, then relaxes, being so very very careful of her nails. “Growing claws when you’re scared, lashing out- that doesn’t sound like something overly demonic.” Mira’s thumb traces down the side of her pointer finger, following the claw all the way to the trembling tip. “It actually kind of sounds like me.”
“Mira does kind of get demonic when she’s cranky, huh?” Zoey says lightly. “But we still love her, right?” Mira scoffs at the dig, but doesn’t protest except for a fond roll over her eyes before they are back to staring through Rumi’s soul.
“Right,” Rumi agrees quietly, because there is no other response to give but full hearted agreement to the question of if they love Mira. “But…” It’s different. Mira isn’t actually a demon. She snaps and bites because that’s how she learned to protect herself growing up. When she snaps and bites, there’s no actual danger of her teeth pressing through flesh and drawing blood. She hasn’t even punched anyone since their early days of becoming Idols, aside from demons.
“Enough, Rumi,” Mira says firmly, but it’s soft in delivery as her other hand lifts to cup Rumi’s face.
Zoey slides forward to grip the opposite side. “No buts,” she adds lightly. “Just trust us, okay? That’s all you need to do. Trust that we love you. Trust that we can handle this. Trust that, whatever happens, we will bring you back. Okay?” Rumi’s throat is tight again, this time with tears as she looks back and forth between her girls.
Her girls who still love her. Who still want her.
Celine was wrong.
“There,” Mira hums, running her fingers over Rumi’s knuckle again. She pinches a finger between her pointer and thumb, gently rolling the soft pad between hers. “See? Brought you back.”
Rumi’s eyes lock on it. Human. The claws are gone. So is the discoloration aside from the new patterns crawling across the back of her hand. As she watches, the last pulses of demonic glow fade out to the normal dormant purple. Except even that color looks softer, somehow. More lilac than plum.
She lets out a shuddering breath, shoulders slumping in relief, and the abrupt loss of tension almost has her tipping forward into her soup, but her girls are still there and their hands steady her. They tighten. They hold her up. They don’t shy away from her monstrousness.
Celine was wrong.
A laugh bubbles out of her squeezing throat. It sounds like a sob, and more skin presses against her, enveloping her, and it’s so nice. She’s out of control, her faults are on display, and her fears bleed from her like open wounds, but they are not scared.
Her mouth full of teeth is pressed, by a hand at the back of her head, firmly into a warm chest, where she can feel a rapid beating just underneath. The hand on the back of her head scratches soothing nails into her scalp, and she laughs again- wet and blubbering- with the tumbling, jagged feeling emotions wrecking havoc inside her.
She should have trusted them. Gods, she should have trusted them.
She will this time.
Something in her settles with the decision, calming and smoothing the grief and self-hate that’s been ravaging her chest nearly her whole life. Instead, it evolves into something… quiet. Bearable. Like hope.
For the first time since the start of this conversation, Rumi’s arms lift, and she reaches for them in return. Her fingers tangle in fabric without the intention of letting go.
“Okay,” she agrees.