i'm gonna skip over all my moonangel bean wip's I haven't even posted yet real quick to urgently bring you the concept of tiny half elf baby ears going wiggle wiggle while nursing. kitten style
Chapters: 1/?
Fandom: KPop Demon Hunters (2025)
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Mira/Rumi/Zoey (KPop Demon Hunters), Mira/Rumi (KPop Demon Hunters)
Characters: Rumi (KPop Demon Hunters), Mira (KPop Demon Hunters), Zoey (KPop Demon Hunters), Bobby (KPop Demon Hunters)
Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, Light Angst, Fluff, look i know this premise sounds angsty but it's me, Pregnancy, it's not the focus but it is there, Lovergirl Mira (KPop Demon Hunters), Confident Rumi (KPop Demon Hunters), (at least after chapter 1), Zoey shows up in chapter 2, Rotating POVs, Alternate Universe - No Demons (KPop Demon Hunters)
Summary:
Everyone knows that co-stars Rumi and Mira are soulmates, even if their marks haven't come in yet. And when an incident on set prevents Rumi's mark from ever forming, Mira is committed to making sure that Rumi never forgets the bond that ties them together.
Seven years later, a stranger named Zoey shows up bearing Mira's soulmate mark. And that... that's going to be a problem.
thank you to everyone who participated and still is participating in zoerumi ficlet week!! i've collected all the tumblr posts below, so please go give them some love! also, if you're looking for more zumi ficlets for these prompts, you can find them here: https://archiveofourown.org/collections/ZumiFiclets2026
A/N: This takes place in the love can’t make you strong (until love can make you weak) universe, before that fic starts. You don’t have to read that for this, just know that Rumi and Zoey are childhood friends before Zoey’s family moves to the US. They reconnect as soon as Zoey moves back.
The grass tickles the back of Rumi’s neck and along her arms as she lets herself flop into the lawn. Above her the night sky stretches to infinity, stars glimmering throughout.
Rumi loves the stars.
She loves the infinite expanse of them, the promise of possibility. Loves the way her eomma loves them. Loves how sometimes after dinner they’ll sit outside together, and Eomma will brush Rumi’s hair and rebraid it while pointing out specific stars, or different constellations while telling her their stories.
A bright giggle next to her, and Rumi’s cheek turns into the grass to absorb Zoey’s grin.
“Look,” Zoey says, arm pointed upward and zigzagging. “There’s a shark! See his fin?”
Rumi follows, as best she can, the wide gesture, following the line of stars. “I see him,” she gasps as her mind slots them into space, the long body, the proud tail. She scans the night sky, passing over Ursa Major and the Leos, the ones she can never see as anything else. “Oh, there!” She leans over, shoulder pressing into Zoey’s, hand directing her eyes farther left. “There’s a wolf, howling at the moon.”
(She’d asked Eomma about a wolf constellation, and been told that it wasn’t visible from their house. But that’s okay. Wolves live in packs; there can be more.)
“Ooooh.” Zoey nods, eyes darting about the sky, and they trade off their own constellations until called inside for bed.
——
Rumi leans against the car hood, head tipped up toward the night sky as she stretches her back out. She’d been driving for several hours; jumping out long enough to toss Zoey’s bags in the trunk did not count as a break, at least not according to the stiffness lingering throughout her body.
Zoey had fallen asleep almost as soon as they’d rolled out of the airport. Apparently the excitement of moving back had not been enough to override the exhaustion from the flight, which Zoey had described as ‘hellish’ through a tight smile.
She’d woken up starving about twelve kilometers back, and so now they were parked outside the closest convenience store their phones had found. Zoey’s inside, and Rumi is taking the moment to stretch and maybe tame the way her stomach is trying to tie itself into knots.
They’d kept in touch over the years, phone calls and video screens, little messages and gifts. So Rumi already knew the way that Zoey’s voice had changed, the subtle changes to the shape of her face. She’d heard Zoey’s half-hearted complaints about her height, hadn’t been startled at all during their too brief welcome hug when Zoey’s face only hit her shoulder.
Rumi just hadn’t been prepared for how it felt to have Zoey next to her again. How right it seemed, even with Zoey passed out against the car window and her sweatshirt lightly emanating that stale airplane scent.
A shoulder bumps against hers and the car rocks slightly as another weight throws itself against her. “I got enough to share,” Zoey announces, holding up a plastic bag that sags under its weight.
Rumi laughs. “Are you sure you didn’t just buy everything that looks good and only then realize you couldn’t eat it all?”
“Maybe,” Zoey says teasingly, in that slightly deeper voice that tips Rumi’s head back toward the sky before she can say anything she’ll regret.
She keeps her eyes there, the streetlights and lights from the store drowning out any hope at making out any but the brightest of stars, even as the crinkling of a wrapper announces that Zoey’s starting to eat. A hiss of a can follows after, and they spend a few moments in an easy silence.
“Hey, look,” Zoey says, her voice softer, and Rumi’s traitorous stomach flips at the sound. “Isn’t that the wolf constellation?”
Rumi wrenches her head around so quickly that she thinks she’ll feel it later, meets Zoey’s eyes, which are watching her warmly but warily, a twitch of anxiety at the corner of her mouth. Rumi’s eyes drop to her lips, pull back up over her face. The California sun has tanned her skin, made her freckles stand out all the more.
(Rumi wonders what constellations she can find there.)
“I missed you,” she breathes out instead, because of course Zoey remembered something like that.
Zoey’s answering wide smile is as bright as Rumi remembers.
A/N: A B-side to the above (with much love and appreciation for @barrhorn for helping make it work).
---
Zoey learns that when things are far away enough, there’s a point where it doesn’t matter so much exactly how far they are. Alpha Centauri is four and a quarter lightyears away from Earth; Burbank is nine thousand five hundred kilometres away from Seoul; Rumi’s house is five hundred metres away from Zoey’s old house.
Zoey’s new house might as well be on Alpha Centauri. Because either way, Zoey can’t walk to Rumi’s house anymore. Zoey can’t see her in school anymore. Zoey can’t see her—
“It’s the same hemisphere,” Rumi says, quietly. Her eyes don’t go with her smile. “So we’ll see the same stars.”
“Yeah.” They’re curled up side by side on her bed, almost forehead to forehead, the way secrets should be shared. They’re still holding hands. Zoey has to let go soon, because her dad is waiting outside the door, and there’s a car waiting too, and a plane, and an ocean. For the first time probably ever in her life, she wishes the ocean were a little less big. “If I had like, a billion dollars, I could fix a giant space swing all the way up there. So we could just—”
Carefully, really carefully, because Rumi’s still healing up and Zoey can keep at least one hurt from her if she’s careful. Carefully, Zoey swings their hands in a big curve to demonstrate, puffs her cheeks up and makes her best pshewww noise for extra effect.
Rumi giggles, and now her eyes and smile go together better, and Zoey feels her own giggles bubbling up as she keeps swaying their hands back and forth, back and forth, squeezes and feels a squeeze back.
Zoey thinks about how even the stars swing right back around, if you just wait long enough.
“Zoey.” Her name from outside the door. Not angry, but warning. Zoey hesitates, but Rumi’s fingers go loose. She knows that tone too.
“It’s okay,” she says, and it’s not, it’s not; Zoey’s hand grips her sleeve, moves to her back, but she’s not supposed to hug Rumi, not supposed to press anywhere on her body. But Zoey wants, needs to, doesn’t know how—
Rumi’s breath hitches, but no sound escapes.
“I’ll—” Zoey starts. Swallows the wobble and tries again. Stronger. “I’ll keep in touch, okay? I promise.”
Rumi’s eyes widen. Start to glisten. “Okay,” she whispers. “I’d like that.”
Zoey nods, nods, pulls back, feels her fingers slide off of Rumi’s shoulder, Rumi’s hand, all the way to the last second, and she walks backwards to the bedroom door, five steps, six.
(Seven: out the door, to a whole universe away.)
—
It’s about when Zoey’s cramming the seventh bag of convenience store buns under an elbow that she thinks maybe this is too many snacks. But there’s a tell-tale twisting and growling feeling in her gut that she knows is only partly the nerves, and then partly the jet lag, and the post-car nap sluggishness, and the nine hours since the last time she got to eat (thanks no thanks to the flight from hell,) and it won’t take more than twenty dollars to fix one of those things.
She should get a basket. She gets a basket. There’s still the chips aisle to raid, and heck yeah, now she’s got plenty of stacking room on the snack pile. In goes the shrimp crackers, in goes the honey butter chips, in goes the—
Her hand pauses over a familiar package.
Maybe it’s still Rumi’s favourite. Or not? Somehow in all the letters and calls and years between them, it’s never come up. Zoey’s never asked, hey do you still like those chips? Do you still like pouring the bits at the end of the bag straight into your mouth? Or do you like different stuff now, doing stuff differently?
…she grabs two anyway. It’s fine. It’s not like they’re not good. She’ll just eat them if Rumi doesn’t.
It’s Rumi. Rumi, who’d blurted an offer before Zoey’d even gotten to talking about the arrival date or the awkward timing, had driven hours into the night just to get her from the airport. Rumi, whose letters are bursting the brims of shoeboxes tucked deep and safe in Zoey’s luggage. Rumi, who’d smiled so wide and opened her arms just as Zoey had run right into her, and even though the hug had lasted maybe two seconds and Rumi’s so much taller and broader now (unfair!) it’d been warm, and tight, and—
Look, Zoey’s not super hug-deprived! But nobody gives hugs like the Ryus. Like Rumi.
That much hasn’t changed.
(Rumi, taller and broader, waiting past the convenience store windows. Curved in profile against the hood of a car she’s old enough to drive, now, head tilted towards the stars, fingers rubbing absently at her arm in a way that makes Zoey’s palms itch. Makes Zoey think of rain beating on rooftiles, of huddling together under one blanket, of the slow nervous circles Rumi would quietly trace on her own arms until Zoey’s hand wiggled into hers, held it until the wind stopped howling.)
Zoey takes a breath. Pays for the stuff, says something hopefully normal to the cashier, heads for the doors and the five, six, seven steps back to the car.
(Lets gravity do its thing. Tug them back into orbit.)
—--
“I missed you,” Rumi says, and it feels like every weight drops from Zoey at once, lets her mouth beam wide.
They split the snacks. Zoey inhales three buns and feels slightly more like a person again. Rumi breaks open that packet of chips, and even though she eats them a couple pieces at a time instead of grabbing them by the handful, she still tips the bag back into her mouth once she gets to the bottom.
They talk about the stars, then about light pollution, then about cities and lizards and a dozen other things, and it’s only when Rumi gently takes hold of the half-full can slowly sliding out of Zoey’s fingers that Zoey realises they’re still shoulder to shoulder, still tucked right where they were when Zoey first hopped up to join Rumi on the car, warmth sandwiched between them.
“We should probably make a move,” Rumi says, soft and probably right and maybe, Zoey thinks, a little regretful about it.
And maybe it’s that, or the jet lag, or the stomach full of food, or all of them tag-teaming the buzzing thoughts and nerves into a softer, fuzzier morass to sink into, but either way Zoey feels like the appropriate thing to do is bury her face in Rumi’s sleeve and whine a little, so she does. Rumi pats her on the shoulder, all fondness, but gives her at least another minute or so, which Zoey takes full advantage of by breathing in the scent of soap and skin.
The leftovers get bagged, the trash in the proper bins. Time and moving get a little blurry round the edges. But eventually they’re on the road again, Rumi fiddling with the thermostat, then the sound system; Zoey making a cocoon of two of the three blankets she’d teased Rumi for when she’d first seen them neatly folded and stacked in the backseat, next to the little potted plant carefully buckled in.
Slow electronic beats filter through the speakers, a familiar tune playing in that in-between volume between waking and dozing. Rumi’s hand hovers in the air beside the steering wheel; then settles on the center console, palm up.
(Casual. Deniable.)
Without a second thought, Zoey slips a hand out from between the blankets, weaves her fingers between Rumi’s. Squeezes lightly, carefully; feels Rumi curl around her in turn.
Zoey lifts their joined hands just a few inches, lets them fall back to the console. Pshewww, she breathes out.
Rumi’s laughter is the last thing she catches before sleep rolls back in.
Rumi sends back just a thumbs up in reaction to Zoey’s last line and leans back in her chair, taking a sip of her coffee as she looks out the cafe’s broad window into the street. It’d be a lie to claim she wasn’t curious about Zoey’s girlfriend — her other girlfriend.
She knows nothing about her, but that’s fine. Zoey doesn’t know anything about Rumi’s other girlfriend either. They’re all open about dating other people, but have so far kept the lines soft and shadowy. The only glimpse Rumi’s ever gotten behind the veil is when Zoey’s phone rang while sitting on the counter as they made breakfast; Zoey’s half inside a cabinet looking for a bag of chocolate chips she swore she still had. The screen had just read ‘Lovergirl’ as the contact, and Rumi had called Zoey right after that just to see how her number was saved.
(Answer: under ‘Sweetheart’, and Zoey had gotten a kiss on the cheek before taking her phone out to the living room to call her girlfriend back.)
Dating two people at once, knowing that both her girlfriends are seeing someone else, makes Rumi feel relieved rather than jealous. The balance between her work and life is a delicate thing that she’s still figuring out. As much as she craves her girlfriends’ attention and loves to lavish her own on them in return, knowing that she is not letting them down when she burrows into a new song for a week takes some of the weight off. And sometimes she still finds herself tongue tied in a social situation, struggling to find the right words to say.
Mira grounds her, pulls Rumi’s head out of the clouds with kindness and care and the occasional well-placed bit of sarcasm. Rumi always leaves Mira with her heart settled and warm.
Zoey lifts her up, radiates adoration when Rumi can match her energy as well as when Rumi’s withdrawn. Zoey always makes Rumi feel energized, confident, ready to take on the world.
Rumi finds herself smiling at nothing and no one, pulls a long sip from her coffee to hide her expression even as her eyes refocus on the window. Maybe Zoey’s girlfriend will drop her off right outside the shop and Rumi can catch a glimpse of the woman who Zoey also adores.
(Rumi’s certain that if Zoey likes her that much, Rumi would like her as well.)
The door jingles, and Rumi’s attention turns as Zoey enters. And her welcoming smile freezes as Zoey leans back to hold the door open with a giggle, and a pink-haired woman follows in after her.
Oh yeah. She definitely likes Zoey’s other girlfriend.
After all, Rumi’s dating her too.
Zoey, all unknowing, turns and waves, with the same enthusiasm as if she was trying to get Rumi’s attention from across a crowded plaza rather than a mostly-empty cafe. “Rumi, hi! Sorry to keep you waiting!”
Rumi stands as Zoey darts toward her in as straight a path as the various chairs allow. Even as Zoey wraps her into a hug and Rumi leans into it with a sigh, arms winding around Zoey’s waist, she looks over her shoulder to see Mira’s dumbstruck expression settle into a smile, and then into a smirk that promises mischief. She meets Rumi’s eyes, and Rumi feels a thrill course through her as she dips her chin in a nod that Zoey takes as her snuggling further in, cooing affectionately in Rumi’s ear.
“Oh, and you should meet—” Zoey starts, pulling back. She doesn’t get too far back, hands still on Rumi as Mira slides in close, close, close, and tilts Rumi’s chin up.
“Hi, princess,” Mira says, voice low and wonderful, and Rumi can’t help the silly little grin as she pushes up to meet Mira halfway, kissing her more deeply than she usually would in public because she can hear Zoey’s little intake of breath, can feel the way Zoey’s fingers curl.
Rumi settles back. “Hello dear,” she responds, loving the way Mira’s eyes warm with affection at both the endearment and the way Rumi’s playing along. Rumi then turns her attention back to Zoey, all too aware of how Mira’s hand lingers, casually possessive, on her hip. “Don’t apologize for being late,” she says, as casual as if nothing had just happened. “There’s still plenty of time before the movie starts.”
“I—” Zoey starts, eyes darting between them, “you—”
“Breathe, Zoey,” Mira tells her, affection overlapping with amusement in her tone. “Though I guess we are being rude. Have you met my girlfriend Rumi?”
“Hey Mira,” Rumi says, voice dripping with an innocence that makes both of them focus on her; she bites her cheek to hide her grin. “Are you busy this afternoon? Want to see a movie?”
“Forget the movie,” Zoey says, under her breath. “I’d watch 90 minutes of that.”
That breaks the moment, in a way that makes Rumi and Mira both laugh, hands falling away from each other, creating a little more space for all three of them. Rumi retakes her seat; Zoey lets herself fall into another; Mira excuses herself to go get a drink of her own — the original reason she’d entered.
Rumi reaches over, soothes her thumb over the back of Zoey’s knuckles, suddenly nervous about the teasing. “Was that okay?”
“Yeah,” Zoey confirms immediately enough that it eases the growing tension in Rumi’s shoulders. “I was nervous when Mira said she was coming in with me, but I think that’s the best result I could’ve asked for.” She hesitates slightly, fingers drumming along the table’s surface. “Did you mean it though? The movie part?”
“Inviting her along?” Rumi asks, and hums at Zoey’s nod. “I was teasing, but we could ask for real, if that’s what you want.”
Zoey looks up at her, with a softer, unguarded smile that Rumi cherishes. Zoey is always so bright, projecting enthusiasm and confidence without any apparent effort. Moments like this, when she lets herself ask for something she wants, really lets Rumi see how much it means, are on the rarer side, and Rumi swells with pride that she’s granted them at all. “I think it’d be fun,” she offers.
“Then we’ll ask,” Rumi tells her. “I think so too.”
—
At the theater, Mira buys the popcorn, Zoey buys the snacks, and Rumi buys the drinks. “This is a little ridiculous,” she laughs as she hands over her card, and Zoey leans into her with a grin.
“Ridiculous and perfect,” she says, and Rumi’s never been one to argue with her.
They put Zoey in the middle and, as the lights go down, Mira and Rumi’s eyes meet and they lean down at the same time to kiss Zoey’s cheeks.
—
Afterwards, Mira insists on them coming over to her place. “I just realized,” she complains as she shoves open the door and ushers them both inside, “that every time both of my girlfriends were too busy for me and left me alone with my cat, they were probably together.”
Rumi and Zoey share a look, twin grins blooming.
“So by my count you two owe me like. Five dinners.”
“Okay, lovergirl,” Rumi says as Zoey cackles. “We’ll make it up to you.”
Dinner turns into dessert, which turns into one more round of drinks, which turns into dozing on the couch and trying to summon up the will to go home.
Mira herds them into pajamas and teeth brushing, settles them into her bed. Zoey’s already curled into Rumi’s chest and snoring lightly when Mira snaps off the light and curls herself over Zoey’s back.
Before sleep takes her, Rumi’s last thought is that she’s going to need a bigger bed in her place.
Rain is supposed to patter against the windows, Rumi thinks. This is a fierce, pounding rhythm, the wind sweeping sheets of water against the glass until it almost shudders in its frame. The thunder growls, and Rumi shakes her head as the kettle clicks off. After carefully making two cups of tea, she returns to the small living room of her apartment, handing one mug over to the woman on her couch.
“You said you walked here, right?” Rumi asks, and Zoey nods. “I guess we’re watching another movie, then. I’m not sending you out in that.”
Zoey grins, wiggling deeper into the corner of the couch like she was made to be there, even as she lifts an eyebrow teasingly. “Marine biologist, remember? I can handle a little water.” Another glass-rattling batter of rain. “Or a lot of water.”
“Unless you brought your scuba tank, even you would drown out there,” Rumi fires back as she settles opposite Zoey and picks up the remote with her free hand.
“Good thing I never go anywhere without—!” Zoey declares, then starts patting at her pockets with a comically exaggerated expression of dismay that has Rumi biting back laughter. “I must have left it in my other pants.”
“You’re stuck, I’m afraid,” Rumi says drily, then tenses a little. “Unless you don’t want to stay,” she adds quickly. “I’m not saying you can’t go—”
Zoey starts responding before Rumi can finish, “Oh, I just don’t want to impose—”
But Rumi can’t stop the words from coming, trying to smooth out any misunderstanding. “I can get a car for you, if you want—”
“It’s really nice of you to offer and everything, but I know you have work tomorrow and—”
“Or I could drive you, but it’s really no big deal.”
“I don’t want to be a bother.”
They finish at about the same time, looking at each other with slightly wide eyes, breath caught in their throats.
Zoey cracks into laughter first, and Rumi follows after, her laughter sending Zoey’s only spiraling higher until she’s full on giggling and waving her hand like it could get Rumi to stop. Unfortunately this only makes Rumi laugh harder and wrench herself forward to get her mug on the table before she can spill it all over herself.
Giggles peter out into breathlessness, until Zoey hiccups a little and sets Rumi off, who bites down on her knuckle to muffle her laughter even as Zoey ramps up again.
It takes a moment before they’re both under control; Rumi’s cheeks hurt from smiling and Zoey’s cheeks have pinked.
“You’re not imposing,” Rumi says. “I’m offering. I’d feel terrible if you got sick.” They’d had other plans for their date tonight, but the rain (at the time, just a light shower) had made those less appealing. Rumi had instead impulsively asked Zoey over instead, not wanting to miss out on time together.
(Zoey had agreed with enough haste that Rumi had felt less awkward about the sudden invitation. For someone she’d met online and had only three dates with so far, Zoey’s quickly becoming a bright spot in her life.)
“Okay,” Zoey agrees, even as her fingers tap restlessly against her thigh. “I’m having fun,” she reassures with that same sort of energy. “I just don’t want to cause any trouble.”
Rumi hums to buy herself a moment, flipping through the possible answers in her head, before landing on the one that has her shift slightly, cast her eyes over to Zoey with a small smile. “You can cause a little trouble,” she teases, and is rewarded with the pink across Zoey’s face deepening.
Zoey must note her amusement, because she straightens, eyes flashing. “Only a little?” she asks, voice silky smooth.
“Alarm is set for 6:15,” Rumi tells her. “If that helps.”
“We have time for one more movie,” Zoey declares, and after a short debate, they put on a drama.
One that Rumi is paying no attention to, not when Zoey shifts to sit closer, settling cross-legged on the couch so that her knee brushes against Rumi’s thigh. Not when hands meet and intertwine, or fingertips stroke lightly over a wrist. It’s as soothing as it is electrifying, and Rumi feels herself relax into the couch and Zoey’s warmth.
Gone are the good intentions of getting together pillows and blankets, of having the ‘who’s sleeping where’ argument, of saying good night.
Rumi wakes up with the sun streaming through the windows, a crick in her neck, and a weight slumped into her side. Blearily, she checks her phone. 6:08.
She sighs, closes her eyes. Maybe she should be embarrassed. She doesn’t feel anything but content.
(Okay so this one probably reads as polytrix, the gay just kept gaying)
Tinny laughter floats from the phone, and Mira smiles as she settles herself further into the hotel couch. It’s not nearly as comfortable as their own, and is also severely lacking because Rumi and Zoey aren’t sharing it.
But they are on the call, Zoey swiping at her eyes like she’s about to cry from her laughter, Rumi beaming at her with that too wide smile they adore.
“Tell me what you two were up to during that wall segment,” Mira says, and Rumi bites her lip.
“Was it obvious?” she asks.
Mira has to smile as she shakes her head. “I just know you two. Now spill.”
They’d done a guest turn on a game show while Mira was doing this photoshoot; she’d caught the second half after making it back to her room.
(There will be enough clips shared online soon enough, she knows. And she has the sources right here.)
The segment in question was one where Rumi was stationed at the end of a runway, with a large foam wall headed her way with a large math problem written on it. Possible answers were written on various blocks on the wall; get the answer right and the foam would break away, leaving her unharmed. Get the question wrong, and the wall would remain solid, knocking her back into a tank full of water.
Zoey was standing off to the side for this one, joining in with the host’s commentary. “This is why we let Rumi handle the budget,” she teased, winking outrageously at Rumi. “Now all of Joseon knows you’re a nerd.”
Rumi made it through the first two walls without issue, then hesitated when the third wall started pressing forward, several equations taking up most of the surface area. She shifted hesitantly first to the left, then the right, and the host leaned forward.
“Oh, I think we’ve got her stumped this time,” he’d said, not a little glee in his tone.
“Let’s make it harder,” Zoey added, before starting to shout out random numbers.
The camera had zoomed in on Rumi’s furrowed brow before she’d suddenly straightened with a bright smile and moved confidently in front of a particular answer, arms braced in front of her as the wall hit her— and passed over her, the foam cutoff landing harmlessly to the floor.
Zoey had launched herself onto the runway with a shout, throwing herself into Rumi’s arms and spinning them around. And, in a move made with plausible deniability written all over it, overbalanced them both straight into the water.
Mira’s looking forward to those gifs and stills being all over the internet; Zoey floating face up in the small pit with a devilish smirk; Rumi whipping her braid back like a mermaid, expression torn between irritation and a desperate fondness.
“I’m just saying,” Mira continues. “It looks like Zoey tipped you off.”
Zoey leans into Rumi’s side, and Rumi puts an arm around her and pulls her a little closer. “She was reciting pi, but she skipped all the fives. So I figured that was the answer.”
“Why do you have pi memorized?” Mira asks, holding back her own laughter as Zoey wiggles in her excitement, pressing her lips to Rumi’s cheek before responding.
“There was a contest at school and I wanted to prove the haters wrong,” Zoey shrugs. “So I wrote it like a rap and just… never really forgot it.”
That makes a certain amount of sense, even as Mira notes what Zoey is probably eliding over. Rumi shifts like she notices too, but only kisses Zoey’s head. “And you, Miss Homeschooled?”
Rumi shrugs, though her eyes take on that hunted look she gets when she’s afraid she’s coming off weird. Zoey kisses her again, once, twice, and Rumi’s smile turns sheepish. “I thought it would be fun?” she offers.
When time travel is invented, Mira is going to teach Celine about proper child enrichment.
(Among other things.)
“You two are dorks,” Mira drawls. “I’m embarrassed to be seen with you.”
Both of them laugh. “We miss you too,” Rumi says.
Mira takes another look at them, at Zoey tucked into Rumi’s side, at Rumi wrapping herself around Zoey like she’d collapse without her there. Wants to press this moment into her memory, like flowers between the pages of a book.
(She’s built a large collection. Doesn’t mean she doesn’t want more.)
“Tell me about the rest of it,” she says, shifting, trying to find a more comfortable spot. Wishing for two warm presences on either side of her as Zoey takes a deep breath and begins.
The full moon hangs high and bright. Even humans would be able to see clearly tonight, could sit on the old rocking chair on the porch and look out over the field until the treeline finally blocked their view.
Insects call; the wood creaks under Rumi’s weight as she shifts. And, off in the distance, the howls of wolves.
She could go out and join them. Has done so, at times, when the mood takes her. As the leader of the Honmoon pack, Rumi considers it her duty to socialize and take part in as many pack activities as she can.
But these full moon runs don’t call to her; she has no desire to lift her head and sing to the moon. None of that lives in her blood.
Because Rumi is a tiger in charge of wolves.
(Mostly wolves, at least; the Honmoon pack is less… traditional than other packs, accepts more into their ranks, as long as they abide by pack rules.)
(Like Rumi’s father, a tiger shifter who had wandered onto the pack land twenty five years ago, spent several months with them, and then wandered off again. Before anyone had realized what he’d left behind.)
(“Maybe she’ll be a wolf,” Celine had told Mi-yeong.)
(She wasn’t.)
Tonight, Rumi has already slunk through the forest on her own, taking down a deer and eating her fill before bringing the rest back for the non-hunters of her pack. She took a quick swim in the nearby lake to clean up and burn some more energy, before making her way back to her house and curling up on her front porch. Resting under the moonlight; ready to react if the pack should call for her.
Rumi spends most of her full moon nights alone. She’s used to it.
And then, noise. A rustling of her rose bushes, something bigger than a rabbit. Rumi lifts her head from the deck, nostrils flaring. Despite the flowers’ scent, even with the wind blowing in the wrong direction, she can still smell canine.
She twists over onto her back, raising all four paws and flexing her claws out on all of them, just as Zoey leaps out of the bushes and straight for Rumi.
:Uh-oh, sharp! Sharp!!!: Zoey’s voice resonates in her mind, more brazen than afraid. Still, she tries to pull up, lands slightly awkwardly on her front feet and skids across the deck, nails scrabbling against the wood. Her momentum carries her all the way forward, sending her crashing into Rumi. And then Zoey just snuggles herself further into the long white hairs of Rumi’s stomach, pushing a grunt out of the tiger. :Hi, I missed you.:
:Shouldn’t you be with the others?: Rumi asks, sheathing her claws. Zoey is lovely, a sweetheart of a girl who joined the pack a year or so ago. Bright and cheerful, always ready to lend a hand, no one objects to her presence. But she is, admittedly, a bit of a runt, and a wolf who can often be found playing just as much as hunting. Some of the more staunch traditionalists among the Honmoon turn up their noses at her, sometimes treating her with little more respect than a pup.
Rumi knows better. Zoey is a precise hunter when she needs to be, and when the flu had laid half the pack low one month, she’d brought in more than her fair share so that no one had to be forced into action. Too bad the old fogies had been some of the sickest, and unable to see her contributions.
All which meant that Zoey wasn’t helping herself, leaving the pack run to hang out with Rumi instead.
:Nah,: Zoey replies easily. She burrows her head under Rumi’s front leg, wiggles forward until it lays over her shoulders; her tail sweeps across Rumi’s lower stomach in a slow, almost ticklish rhythm. :They’re doing fine without me. And,: she adds, drawing out the word, :like I said, I missed you.:
Rumi huffs, even as she lets herself indulge in a few quick drags of her tongue over Zoey’s head. :So you try to ambush me at me own home.:
:I’m livening up your night,: Zoey giggles, tail whacking against Rumi with more enthusiasm.
Despite that claim, when Rumi doesn’t respond, Zoey lets the silence last. Lets the other wolves sing without her, even if little noises slip from her jaws now and then. The wind picks up and Rumi’s chest expands against Zoey as she takes in their home: old growth trees, the lake, the bonfire down at the central plaza. Roses and the wolf snuggled into her.
:I was wondering,: Rumi starts, her own tail lashing once and knocking against the rocking chair. It creaks almost nervously. :if you’d like to move into here.:
:With you?: Zoey asks, trying to raise her head but unable to, having effectively trapped herself under Rumi’s weight.
:With me,: Rumi confirms, then quickly says, :there are two empty bedrooms, after all.:
Zoey squirms and kicks until Rumi shifts so that she can free herself, only for Zoey to launch herself off the deck, spinning in a few circles before looking at Rumi with glee in her eyes. :Yeah! I’ll go grab my stuff!:
:Later.: Rumi advises. :Opposable thumbs would probably help.:
:You’re right,: Zoey sighs. And then throws her head back and howls, wordless joy and welcome soaked through her tone.
Distant voices howl in answer. Family and home and safe and freedom.
“There’s a phase two?!” Zoey groans as she watches the boss stand back up, their laughter crackling through her headphones. She glances down to her party’s status: all health bars in the red, mana almost empty. Ballad’s inflicted with silence, and there is just no way that she has enough healing items to get through this.
Warm lips press against her cheek, and Zoey sighs into the affection.
“I’m going to bed,” Rumi says, a teasing light to her eyes. And maybe Zoey had promised her that they would go after she beat the boss, and maybe that had been over an hour ago, but how was she supposed to anticipate this level of difficulty spike?
So now Rumi is abandoning her and the book she’s been reading, bookmark tucked neatly into place, the novel aligned with the corner of the coffee table.
Zoey grins. Her girlfriend is such a freak. “Okay,” is all she says. “I might give it another try or two.”
“Don’t make me fall asleep alone,” Rumi pouts, and Zoey has to kiss her. Only briefly, pulling back and lifting one of the headphones off her ear with a slight grimace of apology when Rumi sways toward her.
“Sorry, the boss music is killing the vibe,” she says, and Rumi just laughs and shakes her head before heading toward her room.
Zoey wipes out on phase two, doesn’t even get back to that point after some really bad luck with status ailments during the second attempt. Groans a little, then decides that it’s just not happening tonight. She turns off the console, flips off the lights. Pauses outside Rumi’s room with her hand outstretched, trying to remember if she’d grabbed her phone charger, when she hears a small gasp that she knows too well and sends a jolt through her body.
Charger forgotten, Zoey pushes open the door. And there’s Rumi on her bed, shirt rucked up around her middle, stomach exposed, one hand under her shirt and the other in her sleep shorts. “Getting started without me?” she asks, softly shutting the door behind her.
“Mmm,” Rumi hums her agreement as she lolls her head to look Zoey’s way. The hand moving in her shorts doesn’t stop. “Did you beat him?” she asks, smile fond, the patterns around them glowing lightly with her arousal.
“No,” Zoey says, moving toward the bed. “I think I need to grind out more healing items, maybe a few more levels.”
Another little hum, and Rumi’s eyes watching her approach hungrily. “Anything else you want to grind out?”
Pause.
Silence.
Rumi’s patterns flare a deeper pink, mortification creeping in. Her hand pulls out of her shirt, grabs the nearest pillow and presses it over her face. “No, don’t say anything,” she says, even as giggles start bubbling up Zoey’s throat. “I already regret it.”
Zoey lets the laughter flow, pulls her shirt off as she climbs into the bed, whistling a triumphant little theme. “Zoey joins the party!” she announces, settling her hands on Rumi’s sides, stroking her thumbs over her skin.
“Please,” Rumi groans, but her lips are curved upward and Zoey leans down to kiss her jaw.
“C’mon,” Zoey coaxes, fluttering kisses down Rumi’s neck. “I know how to level up this experience.”
The pillow shifts back, and Rumi is looking at her with laughter dancing in her eyes, her patterns pulsing with it. “Well,” she sighs, and suddenly hands are pressed gently to Zoey’s cheeks, guiding her head back up so Rumi can kiss her. “I guess this is more fun in co-op,” Rumi murmurs.
“We can try versus later,” Zoey suggests, only to find her world turning over, Rumi suddenly looming over her as Zoey is pressed into the mattress. “Now’s good too,” she breathes.
Later, sated and snuggled up, a phrase flashes into Zoey’s mind, and she bolts upright.
“You just landed a clitical hit!” she exclaims, and feels the pillow whack her between the shoulder blades.
A/N: This takes place in the love can’t make you strong (until love can make you weak) universe, before that fic starts. You don’t have to read that for this, just know that Rumi and Zoey are childhood friends before Zoey’s family moves to the US. They reconnect as soon as Zoey moves back.
The grass tickles the back of Rumi’s neck and along her arms as she lets herself flop into the lawn. Above her the night sky stretches to infinity, stars glimmering throughout.
Rumi loves the stars.
She loves the infinite expanse of them, the promise of possibility. Loves the way her eomma loves them. Loves how sometimes after dinner they’ll sit outside together, and Eomma will brush Rumi’s hair and rebraid it while pointing out specific stars, or different constellations while telling her their stories.
A bright giggle next to her, and Rumi’s cheek turns into the grass to absorb Zoey’s grin.
“Look,” Zoey says, arm pointed upward and zigzagging. “There’s a shark! See his fin?”
Rumi follows, as best she can, the wide gesture, following the line of stars. “I see him,” she gasps as her mind slots them into space, the long body, the proud tail. She scans the night sky, passing over Ursa Major and the Leos, the ones she can never see as anything else. “Oh, there!” She leans over, shoulder pressing into Zoey’s, hand directing her eyes farther left. “There’s a wolf, howling at the moon.”
(She’d asked Eomma about a wolf constellation, and been told that it wasn’t visible from their house. But that’s okay. Wolves live in packs; there can be more.)
“Ooooh.” Zoey nods, eyes darting about the sky, and they trade off their own constellations until called inside for bed.
——
Rumi leans against the car hood, head tipped up toward the night sky as she stretches her back out. She’d been driving for several hours; jumping out long enough to toss Zoey’s bags in the trunk did not count as a break, at least not according to the stiffness lingering throughout her body.
Zoey had fallen asleep almost as soon as they’d rolled out of the airport. Apparently the excitement of moving back had not been enough to override the exhaustion from the flight, which Zoey had described as ‘hellish’ through a tight smile.
She’d woken up starving about twelve kilometers back, and so now they were parked outside the closest convenience store their phones had found. Zoey’s inside, and Rumi is taking the moment to stretch and maybe tame the way her stomach is trying to tie itself into knots.
They’d kept in touch over the years, phone calls and video screens, little messages and gifts. So Rumi already knew the way that Zoey’s voice had changed, the subtle changes to the shape of her face. She’d heard Zoey’s half-hearted complaints about her height, hadn’t been startled at all during their too brief welcome hug when Zoey’s face only hit her shoulder.
Rumi just hadn’t been prepared for how it felt to have Zoey next to her again. How right it seemed, even with Zoey passed out against the car window and her sweatshirt lightly emanating that stale airplane scent.
A shoulder bumps against hers and the car rocks slightly as another weight throws itself against her. “I got enough to share,” Zoey announces, holding up a plastic bag that sags under its weight.
Rumi laughs. “Are you sure you didn’t just buy everything that looks good and only then realize you couldn’t eat it all?”
“Maybe,” Zoey says teasingly, in that slightly deeper voice that tips Rumi’s head back toward the sky before she can say anything she’ll regret.
She keeps her eyes there, the streetlights and lights from the store drowning out any hope at making out any but the brightest of stars, even as the crinkling of a wrapper announces that Zoey’s starting to eat. A hiss of a can follows after, and they spend a few moments in an easy silence.
“Hey, look,” Zoey says, her voice softer, and Rumi’s traitorous stomach flips at the sound. “Isn’t that the wolf constellation?”
Rumi wrenches her head around so quickly that she thinks she’ll feel it later, meets Zoey’s eyes, which are watching her warmly but warily, a twitch of anxiety at the corner of her mouth. Rumi’s eyes drop to her lips, pull back up over her face. The California sun has tanned her skin, made her freckles stand out all the more.
(Rumi wonders what constellations she can find there.)
“I missed you,” she breathes out instead, because of course Zoey remembered something like that.
Zoey’s answering wide smile is as bright as Rumi remembers.
The door closes behind Celine and Zoey takes a deep breath, mentally congratulating herself for holding herself together while finally meeting one of her longtime idols. She’d really wanted to make a good first impression.
Which probably makes it a good thing that Celine has left, for as soon as Zoey is left alone with Rumi — and wow, this girl is beautiful even in grayscale, looks like she just stepped off the cover of a magazine — Zoey bows politely just as Rumi sticks her hand out toward her.
Zoey nearly tips herself off balance with how quickly she jerks herself upright, but by the time she’s reaching for Rumi’s hand, the other girl has bowed instead. For a moment, Zoey is left staring at the top of her head, at the way her braid hangs off her shoulder like it was arranged purposefully.
And then Rumi straightens, eyes looking as wide as Zoey’s feel. A pause. A breath. And then the corner of her mouth tilts upward, her eyes crinkle, and she puts her hand on her stomach as she laughs.
Zoey knows the sound of people laughing at her; that’s not what this is, and the sound tosses aside all her nerves until she finds herself giggling along with the other girl.
“Sorry, sorry!” Rumi apologizes, laughter still escaping her despite her obvious attempts to swallow it back. “Start over?”
“Why?” Zoey asks. “I think that was the best intro we could’ve had.”
“I’d like to, though,” Rumi says, her voice sounding almost… wistful. “Can we?” She holds out her hand again, and okay, okay, refusing and crushing Rumi’s hopeful little smile would make Zoey feel like a monster.
So she takes Rumi’s hand in hers, and gasps as color blooms between them. Starts at their hands, Rumi’s skin paler than her own, and rolls outward, over the black sleeve of Rumi’s jacket, up to her warm brown eyes and then her—
“Your hair’s purple!” Zoey delights, before noting the way that Rumi’s eyes have squinted.
“And your shirt is… very bright,” her soulmate responds, and Zoey looks down and laughs again because yeah, apparently her favorite shirt from a local conservation group is a striking neon green. And then she remembers what Celine had said, just before she left the room. “We have the whole day now? To get to know each other?”
(Later on in the week, Zoey will remember that again and wonder at it. Almost like Celine knew what would happen as soon as they touched.)
At Rumi’s nod, Zoey tugs her eagerly toward the door. “Can we go to the zoo? Or the aquarium? Walk, talk, eat ice cream, see all the animals in color for the first time?”
“Do we have time for both?” Rumi asks, her head tilted to the side, matching that crooked smile that Zoey already melts at. All the anxiety of this meeting — her? They wanted Zoey? For a K-pop group? Really???? — dissolves like mist in the morning sun.
“If we hurry,” she says, picking up the pace and half-dragging Rumi with her until the other girl laughs and half jogs to keep up with her. “No waffling over ice cream flavors, no dawdling at the baby animals, only thirty minutes at the turtle exhibit!”
They pull on their shoes, call out to Celine their plans, and step out into the world, bright and beautiful and full of color.
Portrait commission by the magnificient @s-aint-elmo of Sussie Su-ji from "love can't make you strong (until love can make you weak)", an ongoing KPDH polytrix AU by @barrhorn and me! Once again thank you SO MUCH to ket, they are beautiful and ready to eviscerate (with friendship)
Setting the knife down and turning, Mira is confronted with Zoey holding up a dumpling that has two cat ears sticking up and two mismatched eyes pointed in opposite directions. “He’s not that lumpy. Or blue.”
“It’s art,” Zoey shoots back, “I’m capturing his spirit.”
“In a dumpling. That someone is going to eat,” Mira deadpans, enjoying the way that Zoey’s eyes light up, mouth already open for her comeback. In her peripheral vision, she can see Rumi pause in her work, smiling softly as she watches the exchange.
Zoey lifts the Derpling a bit higher. “It’s called cuteness aggression, Mira. Don’t you ever see something so adorable that you just want to bite it?”
Mira just tilts her head, making sure Zoey can’t miss her smirk, small but unmistakeable.
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