Chapter Text
Rumi swung the door open, only to be met with another empty room, and shut it closed to move on to the next.
Which would also be empty. And so would the next one. And the next one too, just like all of the previous ones...
She opened the next door and...
Big surprise, empty as well!
"Ugh!" She groaned, slamming the door closed and leaning on it for a moment.
This wasn't working... She's been at this for who knows how long and there was nothing!
And Mira and Zoey didn't seem to fare any better either. Each of them reporting when they were done with a floor and so far they each had cleared two without any findings. Without anyone even telling them anything useful...
...!
...!
"Rumi? You good?" Mira's voice was suddenly heard from her pocket, catching her by surprise. For a moment she had forgotten they set up a group call.
"Y-yeah, just... I still got nothing." She sighed, after bringing out her phone. "There's hardly any patients on this floor, I thought the demons could be hiding here, but..."
"Hey. Take a breath. We go this. Okay?"
Rumi breathed, letting Mira's voice anchor her. Remind her it was gonna be okay...
It was, wasn't it...?
"...Okay." She finally said, almost forcing the word out of her mouth, and placed the phone back in her pocket.
But the moment she did, she felt her hand shaking. As if it was already missing holding it, or... something else.
She looked over at her hand...
Patterns gracing its backside, creeping slightly in her palm. Fingers and nails still in their usual length. Still human. Still hers...
And yet...
...
...
She moved herself into a door to the edge of the hallway. Leaning against it the moment she walked through it.
Her breathing rapid, but silent. She didn't want Mira and Zoey to be alarmed. Not now, not yet...
But it was getting harder...
Breathe...
Breathe...
...
...!
"Guys, Bobby is calling!" Zoey called, right after her phone started buzzing.
And surely enough, the notification showed up.
"He probably woke up and is looking for us." Mira said.
"Yeah... yeah..." Rumi added, almost automatically.
"Rumi-"
"We should answer." She cut off Mira, getting her voice and her breathing under control. As much as she could. "Let him know what happened with Celine and... that we'll meet up soon. Otherwise he'll probably start looking for us."
For a moment there was silence. The kind that showed contemplation, surprise... concern...
"Okay." But we'll get to the group call immediately after, right?" Zoey spoke up, her voice carrying a quiet concern. The same Mira's did earlier...
"Yeah. Yeah, of course." Rumi replied, forcing a smile.
"Okay, then. Back in a few." Mira said, carefully neutral and the call ended.
Finally...!
Rumi dropped to the floor the moment they hung up, letting the others handle the call with Bobby. Her focus turned to her hands. Shaking uncontrollably...
The patterns flaring up with a soft purple glow...
Her veins pulsing... as if they were holding back something that desperately wanted to come out...!
...!
...!
So she let it.
She summoned her sword.
And the moment it was back in her hands, relief washed over her. As if a huge weight was lifted off of her shoulders.
She adjusted her grip in an almost tender way, as if she was holding the hand of a loved one. The burning of the patterns had subsided, just like the purple glow.
But then-
"Ru-...mi...!"
...!
That voice, Jinu's voice...! It was back!
"Hi Bobby!" Zoey greeted cheerfully, just as she answered Bobby's call.
"Girls, where are you? I've been looking all over the hospital for you! Any news on Celine?" He asked in a single, worried breath.
"We just met with Doctor Chung. She said Celine will be okay and she'll be getting out of surgery soon. We just got a little lost, looking for the room they'll take her in." Mira answered quickly, ignoring the fact that Rumi hadn't answered the call.
"Oh, okay." Bobby said, with a silent relieved sigh. "Well, just let me know where you'll be when you find it. I'll come meet you later. Right now I have to... meet up with someone."
"With who? You're leaving?"
"No, just going at the entrance. You guys are not gonna believe who called me!"
Mira and Zoey remained silent for a bit, both of them surprised, if a little confused, as they waited for their manager to carry on.
Who would call him now and he'd be ready to meet them, with everything going on right now?
"Gi Ari!" He finally said after a few seconds of silence that felt longer than they should've.
And both girls' eyes went wide hearing that name.
"GI ARI?! As in the third Sunlight Sister Gi Ari?!" Zoey exclaimed, in a mix of shock and excitement.
"Yeah!" Bobby confirmed, mostly shocked as well.
"I thought she had retired. Celine said she wasn't involved with the industry anymore." Mira spoke up, more confused than anything else.
"I thought so too, but she said she wanted to see you guys. And then I told her about Celine and she kinda freaked out about it and now she's-"
Bobby stopped talking. He stopped walking too, seeing that the person he was talking about had just come through the hospital's front door. Dressed in a sleeveless black coat and a pair of black pants. Her hair in a tight top knot. Professional, firm. Nothing like those big puffy pigtails he knew from the concert videos and album covers.
And yet, her expression upon seeing him was the same. Smiley and joyful.
"Greetings. You must be Bobby, right? We spoke on the phone?" She said upon reaching him, giving a respectful bow.
"Uh, yeah. Yes! Yes ma'am!" Bobby replied with an amazed, if a bit awkward smile, returning the bow. "I- It-it is an honor to meet you, miss Gi! Even though the circumstances are less than ideal." And with that both his and Ari's smiles dropped.
"Certainly not..." She sighed, her expression clouded, before looking around for a moment. "Where are your girls? Are they still with the doctor?"
"BOBBY?!"
"BOBBY?!"
And right on cue, Mira and Zoey called out at him from the other side of the phone.
He had almost forgotten they were on a group-call...
"Oh! Girls! Sorry about that!" He smiled sheepishly as he brought up the phone again.
"What happened?" Mira asked.
"Uh, miss Gi just arrived. She's with me at the entra-"
"Mind if I...?" Before he could finish, Ari reached out her hand with a small, charming grin and gently took the phone from him.
Bobby didn't even have the time to think of saying anything, be it agreement or disagreement.
Ari just kept her gaze on him. A gaze that despite the gentleness that surrounded it, in her smile, her movements, her voice... was filled with an absolute, almost cold authority. Something that just screamed that this wasn't a request.
"Huntrix, I presume?" Her smile widened as she brought the phone to her ear.
Mira and Zoey's eyes widened in surprise hearing that voice. A voice they knew from old interviews and vinyl records.
Zoey would feel like she was about to explode, were it not for that... strange tone in her voice.
A tone Mira knew very well. When someone was pretending to be polite, but really was condescending.
"Uh, yeah..." Zoey spoke up first, a small, nervous smile in her words. Feeling torn between her excitement and her apprehension. "Miss Gi, it is such an-"
"Please, dear. I won't have Celine's girls call me that. You can call me Ari." Ari cut her off with a soft chuckle, her voice quickly softening with concern. "Though, I do wish I could've met you under... better circumstances."
"Yeah. Same... Ari." Mira said, almost tiptoeing on her words.
She didn't really know what to make of this, how to handle this. And the fact that they were doing this over the phone wasn't really helping.
As far as she knew, Ari gave up on the Sunlight Sisters and demon hunting not long after the death of Rumi's mother. Celine told them that it was so painful for her that she wanted nothing to do with either anymore.
So why did she reach out to them? And of all the moments to do it, why would she do it now?
"Have you spoken to the doctor? Is Celine all right? Are you with her right now?" Ari asked with a subtly increasing concern, bringing her out of her thoughts.
"We did." Zoey answered the first question quickly. "She said she's gonna be okay and she will be out of surgery too. But weeee... got a little lost, looking for her room." She almost spilled the beans about the demon hunting part, but in the end, decided to keep it under wraps.
At least for now. Bobby was still there after all, they were talking through his phone. And besides... apart from an Idol legend, Ari was also a renowned warrior and demon hunter, even if she had retired from both. They probably wouldn't make a very good impression if they let slip the fact that they were chasing demons just days after turning the Honmoon gold.
...Maybe that was why she reached out to them! Maybe she wanted to congratulate them!
They did complete their predecessors' mission after all!
"I see..." After Zoey's response, her tone shifted into something unreadable. But before the girls could think on it further... "I'm coming over. We could look together and pay her a visit. Where are you now?"
"We're all on different floors. I'm on the twentienth floor now." Zoey was once again the first to answer.
"I'm on the third." Mira answered as well.
But Rumi didn't.
Come to think of it, she hadn't said a thing this entire call.
...
She wasn't in it...
"And... the third of you?" Ari asked after a minute of silence. Again with that same, unreadable tone. Though this time, Mira did recognize a hint of condensation seeping through.
...
"Rumi?" Zoey was heard again. Not sure if she was refering to Ari, asking for clarification, or asking for Rumi to answer.
She must've realized it now herself.
"Last we spoke she was on the eleventh floor." Mira said. "I don't know why she didn't answer, she shou-"
"Maybe this is where Celine is." Ari cut her off. Again... "We can meet up there. Even if she's not in Celine's room, we could go look together."
"Yeah, I guess we could." Zoey agreed, her voice a little sheepish.
"Then it's settled. Meet at the eleventh floor. See you soon, girls." And with that, Ari hung up, disappearing inside an elevator.
"Uh... Miss Gi? My phone." Without giving Bobby his phone back.
"Soooo... Now what?" Zoey asked, after an unsure inhale through her teeth.
"I guess we're going to the eleventh floor to meet Rumi and... Ari." Mira answered, probably a second later than she should've.
"You think she's still there? She didn't answer Bobby's call with us. You think she's okay...?" Zoey's every word was laced with concern, but towards the end it had turned into something else... something heavy and scared.
And she wasn't the only one that felt it. "Let's start another group call."
And they did.
Zoey answered almost instantly.
Rumi didn't. Again...!
"Mira...?" Zoey ventured softly, the fear in her voice stronger, shared between them both.
Big, electrifying, overwhelming. Screaming at them to move!
"Eleventh floor. Now!" Mira spat, already bolting for the elevator, withouth paying any attention to the people in the hallway.
But upon making it there, she stopped abruptly. Met with a small crowd around the elevator doors.
"Excuse me, sorry. What's going on?" She said, pushing through them to reach the person at the front. Barely biting back her impatience.
"The elevator's not coming. It was working just fine a minute ago." He replied, still pressing the button, as if he could make it work if he pressed enough times.
Mira just turned away to the set beside her, but there were people there too.
And when she went back to the call... "Zoey-"
"The elevators aren't working! Why aren't they working?!" Zoey finished for her, accompanied by the sound of frantic button-pressing.
...!
...!
Mira felt the earth beneath her feet slowly give away with her every breath.
The world becoming darker... tighter...
Like a backstage hallway...
"Mira?"
Music playing on the stage...!
Music that shouldn't be playing...!
"MIRA?!"
...!
Zoey's voice called out (right on time...), bringing her back to the hospital. "You okay?! Can you hear me?"
"Yeah... Yeah. I'm here." Mira answered, not sure if she was referring to Zoey or herself.
She heard her sigh on the other side of the phone. Again. And again.
"Zoey, I'm here." She repeated, keeping her voice steady. Grounding. Despite her own adrenaline.
"Yeah. I know." Zoey swallowed as she finished, forcing herself to breathe normally again. This was not the time for this! "We need to find Rumi!"
Rumi felt her breathing hitch, a smile spreading across her face. At first cowardly, disbelieving. Unsure if she could believe that this was really happening and she wasn't dreaming again.
"Ru-...mi...!"
"Jinu...!" But then it just broke free, along with a soft breath she hadn't realized she was holding.
"Rumi...!"
"Yes! I'm here! I can hear you! Wait. Why can I hear you?" Her smile soon gave place to a confusion, when she actually realized that she was basically talking to her own reflection on her sword.
"Ru... Ru...mi...!"
And then to a deadpan, frustrated expression. "Yes, my name is Rumi, we both know that. Can you... Can you hear me?" She asked worriedly, after a second of silence.
A silence that after that stayed for more than a second.
"No... No, no, no!" She called out, the frustration in her voice increasing with every word. "You don't get to do this! You don't get to show up in my dreams and my thoughts and my sword, just to call my name and then disappear again! Talk to me! PLEASE!"
...!
She felt it.
The change in her voice. The pulse.
Just like before...!
Except this time it was smaller. Maybe because the Honmoon was already sealed.
That didn't stop her from shaking. From closing in on herself and looking around wide-eyed, like a scared animal.
Until her eyes fell on her reflection on her blade. For a brief moment catching a glimpse of something else. Of someone else!
"...Jinu?" She ventured once again. Her voice fragile, careful. As if she was talking to a candle that would go out were she to even breathe at it wrong.
...
...
"-...un...!"
She heard him...!
She heard him!
And he didn't say her name again!
What did he say though?
...
"...nee-... t-...-un...!"
"...Run?"
...!
...
This time there wasn't a response.
But there was something else.
Something loud and dissonant and violent. And close.
Rumi felt it pulse strongly through her arms, spreading all over her body, as if a million tiny blades hit her at once.
But she heard something too. Something hitting a wall.
She forced herself to stand up and opened the door, carefully walking outside, her sword still at hand and ready.
And as soon as she was out she saw a woman's silhoutte at the edge of the hallway.
Her hand holding a short sword with a large blade stabbed to the wall. A blade that was made of the Honmoon, just like hers and Mira and Zoey's weapons. And a blade that tore through the wall with the woman's every slow step, making a loud, alomst painful sound.
A sound that still wasn't louder than her humming of an ancient song Rumi knew too well...
"We are hunters, voices strong
Slaying demons with our song
Fix the world and make it right
When darkness finally meets the light."
...
...
She finally looked up at Rumi when the song reached its end, to reveal a manic pair of eyes focused on her. Like a tigress that just spotted her prey, revealing her teeth.
"Miyeong's little bastard. How nice to finally meet you...!" She said with a venomous smile.