the further that the darkness grows, the more thoughts that plague park joon’s mind. there are nightmares in the shadows, and every moment that passes only further serves to remind him about that assignment that’s due in two days that he still has about twenty questions left to answer. what’s worse is that haruhi promised him a fun time, but with the dark that grows, he’s starting to get the feeling that she lied to his face - and when the pull up into a deserted parking lot, he’s more than absolutely sure. “ no.” he says flatly, locking his door and keeping his seatbelt on. “ i don’t care about horror movies, i don’t know what you’re playing at, but i’m not getting out of this car.” his voice is a strangled whine by this point, turning his head to look at haruhi with narrowed and lamenting eyes. “ come on, haruhi, i don’t have time for your tricks. i’ve got homework to do -”
out comes the cameras, the little straps, and her trusty recorder. it’s old and she’d probably benefit from just using more advanced tech, but she’s splurged enough on the heat-sensitive cameras and the more professional ones. she handles them more delicately than she cares about her friend’s sanity, at least – and she looks up, having to go on her tiptoes a bit to see him properly. “hey, this isn’t a trick. i told you we’re going to an amusement park. have you been here? it’s so creepy, it’s perfect! besides, i’m planning to upload this to youtube, so.” she straps on the little flashlight at her shoulder and turns it on to check. yep, all in working order. “besides, i got gear for you, too. if you get killed by a serial killer lurking about in the creaking old amusement rides...at least i’m right there with you! now c’mon, get out so i can put all of this on you. i don’t wanna break anything.”
8 years ago. young and 20 with @chaoticreds‘ queen of hearts, katherine.
violence made this whole thing real, like the cracking hit of broken glass over the edge of the worn, sticky counter, or the resulting blood splayed and sprayed on gin-and-vodka floor. it wasn’t junho’s adding to the dripping liquid, half from red and half from golden brown, and he certainly didn’t hesitate crouching down and searching the older, burlier man’s pockets for money to pay the bartender back then, and take some for his own. the glass could have cut his throat; he was just too fast right now for death and, at the moment, there was some odd satisfaction that death would come nonetheless when he was old and slow, and he would become young again when that whole affair was done. the curse made it so. violence made it real.
as real as it was, he shouldn’t have been surprised that a red-clad foreigner waltzed her way into the dingy, less-frequented bar. a real western melodrama, he was demanded and he sat, listened and waited, idly rubbing the layer of bandages over his knuckle-white hands. seola had given him enough of an earful about the whole affair, and he didn’t need another. “you’re telling me that was your left hand man?” out came the incredulity, drowned sooner rather than later by a swallowed shot of rum on the rocks. he raised the glass between them idly, one arm extended over the table in the booth, holding it between her face and his. the only difference between his drink and the tall meal in front of him is that the one he’s drinking is cheap. both foreign, either way, but junho isn’t one to judge. he wasn’t always from here. “you gotta choose your men better, kiddo. blood on the dance floor is a shitty song, not something to live by.”
what made most of his daily routine was making sure the kingdom was taken care of, which he and titania both own together - making sure the club dwellers and customers got the best service that they can ask for. those who frequent the kingdom have no idea of what sort of business that it was running behind the scenes, about the fact that his club was like the base of the devil’s drug operations and all. all of oberon’s contacts come and go here as well as various other criminals who sungjoon also tries his absolute best to provide for. sungjoon was a man of business, vicious when he wants to be or when he should be. he and his close friend, jun was similar in that regard while he was more of the brains, making all the business decisions. anyway, it was late and the kingdom was near it’s closing hour as sungjoon overlooked the place to make sure everything was organized and getting everything settled for jun’s visit. sungjoon leaned over the counter near his own bar, looking towards his partner and friend as he arrived. “ah… jun. penny for your thoughts? what would you like to end the night?” he asks, eyeing towards the drinks.
junho was a victim of the law. some may call him now as its enemy, but junho liked to think that he was simply ignoring its boundaries. see, the law favoured money most of all, is what he liked to think, and money ran in abundant white-stained amounts in his drawers and all the tiny nooks and crannies the hands of the law could not reach. but the law also liked to think that junho was diabolical, devious – witty and smart enough to upend the foundations of lies it created around its weaknesses – but junho was anything but. he was more brash, head-on, impatient; the business, for the most part, thrived because of sungjoon. the king of the faeries lived up to his wily reputation, locking people into vices and wildness. the devil, on the other hand, was responsible for leading people to him. poring over documents and the specific items in a business deal tore through his patience with the voracity of hellfire, and by the time he finished, the dull thump of the kingdom’s music had subsided to a glaringly open and vacant space, gleaming with what needed to be cleaned and what had already been put away.
rubbing his eyes, like someone who had just woken into the morning – and, in a way, he had – he made his way from the farthest office in its most secluded area to the bar, where sungjoon, like a god, waited behind the counter. “i’m tired, sungjoon,” he grumbled without remorse for his lack of respectful title, sitting down anyway, “but get me rum and coke, if you’d like. i hate working. i hate reading. why can’t we just get money and let that be that?” both hands lay flat on the counter, waiting as patiently as he could, tapping lightly on the surface. “it was much easier when people were stupid and would do anything for fortune or fame or whatever-the-fuck...hah, do you even remember what it was like to be king, old man?”
it probably wasn’t the brightest idea to explore an abandoned theme park in the dead of autumn, right at the cusp of winter. the air felt chillier than usual and, tech-wise, haruhi was more concerned about her cameras running out of battery than she was with joon finding out where they were going. not that it mattered now, of course; they were at least a two hours’ walk away from any decent form of civilisation and haruhi was already parking in the deserted parking lot. “see? told you we’re going to an amusement park,” she says, killing the engine and motioning for joon to follow her out. she doesn’t wait; already she’s going through her equipment at the back of her car, all in a duffel bag. (crude, but efficient.) “you should come with me now...don’t you know that the people who stay in the car get killed first in horror movies?”
🌟 for an act/personal attribute/talent i’m proud of
it’s her innate inability to care for much of what people think – until they say it out loud (but people hardly do that anymore, do they?). to laura, rejection isn’t rejection until they say it to her face; judgement can simply be categorised as creative differences or personal opinions; criticisms are always taken with a grain of salt and a fair amount of respect, considered something to be of a tool to help her improve. there are, of course, plenty of these online, which she doesn’t mind at all, and more often than not, finds them both amusing and constructive – until she gets abusive ones, of course. those get reported and blocked. who needs that kind of negativity in their life?
hi guys! this is obi, and i’m super excited to start! below the cut are a few bulletpoints about my muses, The Devil and Laura. i also included some random plot bunnies/thread ideas for both of them. reply to this post and i’ll even throw in a short starter for the muse of your choosing. i hope we all get to write together uwu
🕯️ for something i regret✂️ for a moment when i lost someone
she never asked him if he loved her.
she didn’t ask why he did all this, either, not when it mattered, and only when it was too late.
they just seemed to keep missing each other, and it was through their own faults, so maybe junho shouldn’t shoulder all the blame – but he did, even as he dropped her off home. there was a time, once, when home would’ve had a mutual meaning for the both of them; an understanding bred from long nights talking on rooftops with cheap cigarettes and even cheaper weed. she didn’t mind it at all when he kissed her and he minded less when she kissed back.
until she didn’t anymore.
one moment in a house she helped him build – a moment when she turned the other cheek and the foundations of a dream crumbled at her retreating steps – and still he didn’t chase after her, didn’t answer her calls, not when it mattered –
glasgow, 17 april 1925 a day before the fire of kelvin hall
edith was sleepwalking again.
her husband naturally found it unnatural. she knew it to be a symptom of a life she hoped to stop remembering. the doctors referred her to somebody to somebody to somebody – an endless line of somebodies – until one told her a story she thought she might be hysterical from knowing. it wasn’t until they told her every detail of a life she had not lived that she even came close to believing, and here it was again, recurring now in her waking moments, haunting her like black cats and closed doors and daughters she cannot find in one room until she checked thrice over. she thought the story to be outlandish, naturally, and that she was unnatural for having such desires at all. the bookkepers, they called themselves, though they worked at kelvin hall with those old books and musty paintings, told her to report anything she might think was relevant, and she thought it another odd request among many.
until her dream led her to elsewhere, to kelvin hall where they worked – and she brushed it off. it was only a dream, not a memory interrupted. nothing more.
some memories haunt in the darkest of hours. in them, in the dark, on the way home, it follows him, heavy, sustaining, unshakeable. in it his hands are too small to hold onto anything properly; he’s too weak; too loud anyway and too much of an open heart. in it, his parents don’t look at him, cold on a rainy night, without so much as an umbrella over his head. the hands that grip his wrists are thick – big sausages for fingers that leave imprints of dirty nails in scrawny arms that strain against their hold. in it, he cries; now, he only trembles in the shower and rests his head against wet tile, hoping it would go away, except it doesn’t, even when he beau provides him with enough love to last ten lifetimes. even with warmth beside him, the chill that it leaves him shuddering, and this time it’s his turn to seek safety, head resting against her shoulder as she rests, arm tight around her middle, following the path of her breathing to guide his own until it’s forgotten again in place of sleep.
haruhi did not like blacks and whites, although it would have been beneficial if she did, especially when it came to hunting down monsters and ghouls that most likely did not exist. she didn’t believe the rationalists, of course, because they were often too boring, but she didn’t believe in the conspiracy theorists either, because they were too intense – she liked to think she was somewhere in the middle, with a healthy amount of belief in what she did and hoped to pursue; the same went for her wardrobe. all that colour would often be mixed for comfort. short shorts and orange sweaters were a staple, and so too were rainbow-striped socks and well-worn shoes she really needed to change. too often the shoes saw the un-walked trail in the woods, trod on fresh ground with broken twigs leading to a nothing-ghoul – but it was worth exploring if it meant she could record it.
take a match and light it and watch the world burn when the finishing embers drop – that’s how easy it is to start a rumour, and just as so to trace it back to its source. some say that junho arrived in geoje to wreck havoc, or crept from the shadows or crawled out of hell to destroy the sanctuary itself; others insist that he’s an agent of the wraiths, as if wraiths had any form of communication other than amongst themselves, and that he’d be willing to push anyone over the sanctuary, over the edge, into the dark. and some – the most insightful ones, the observant ones – insist that he’s just a myth, that he’s just a man, that he can die.
it’s the insightful ones to watch out for. they’re the ones who dropped the match first.
hi guys! this is obi, and i’m super excited to start! below the cut are a few bulletpoints about my muses, The Devil and Laura. i also included some random plot bunnies/thread ideas for both of them. reply to this post and i’ll even throw in a short starter for the muse of your choosing. i hope we all get to write together uwu
KANG JUNHO / The Devil
really takes that devil’s lettuce thing to a whole other level
drug kingpin responsible for Devil’s Advocate
the muscle/charm of the operation, working closely with his bestest buddy and business associate Sungjoon/Oberon who basically manages the business side
junho takes care of the collecting-money and intimidating-people side
28 years old, first came to geoje about 10-11 years ago. started this business about 5-6 years ago and has absolutely shot up in popularity – basically went from a nobody to the most feared? guy on the island
is a bit prickly, very into making deals and is very good at making them vague, making them seem beneficial
and is also a bit more unpredictable than oberon when it comes to violence, what ticks him off, etc.
one day he’ll kill someone for making him drop his ice cream but then on another day he’d sulk about it instead
he was sold off when he was 9 to mafioso and that’s where he made his friend who gave him the formula for the drug that made him rich and famous chaching
that all ended when the wraiths basically killed off 90% of the gang he was with in an ‘accidental’ fire
bookkeepers saved his ass and brought him here
bet they regret it every day
and now he’s here, the devil himself buddy
dating alice hohooho after being her glucose guardian
also used to be in love with seola but that was a long time ago
actually nicer than he seems
SHIMAMOTO HARUHI / Laura
22 year-old nerdy baby
call her haruhi it makes her feel like her fave shoujo anime protag
unlike jun she’s nice, a bit on the weird nerdy side, but still nice, friendly, the kind to open the door for you and, better yet, buy you a drink if you know any ‘good mysteries’
had a family who died at home when she wasn’t there, another fire bc of the wraiths, but she never saw them
put in the orphanage for years but she was never adopted
hangs out at carmilla’s bookshop or katrina van tassel’s shop a lot
also goes on nature walks hoping she’ll come across the korean bigfoot or something
also a useless lesbian
help her
has like 4 different allergies and asthma and a weak immune system idk why she goes out so much
plot bunnies/thread ideas!
JUNHO: he thought u were flirting with alice once and now you gotta have a talk. in an abandoned warehouse. just the two of you and a bat in his hand – oh, you weren’t flirting with her? great, let him buy you a drink
JUNHO: he was a nobody when he came to geoje, basically worked odd jobs here and there...and you just happened to work in that same place about 8 years ago. wow, how time flies
JUNHO: before alice, you were a semi-regular fling. no, don’t get jealous – you always knew he was in love with seola, and it’s weird that they never got together. u ship them
JUNHO: u think alice and junho are cute. how about a ménage à trois?
JUNHO: someone he knew from a past life, preferably in paris or in moscow.
JUNHO: you knew him in the 1940s; you fought in the war together
HARUHI: you’re around the same age and like the same stuff. of course you’ve been friends since she came here
HARUHI: pls convince haruhi to stay inside the sanctuary
HARUHI: nature walk buddy, but you do it so she doesn’t end up hurting herself when she collects rocks she thinks are magical and pretty (for katrina van tassel/jo hara)
HARUHI: u rushed her once to the hospital because she forgot her epipen and forgot she was allergic to basil/nuts/tomatoes/grapes. now u always have an epipen with u bc she has a habit of forgetting hers
HARUHI: u never once realised she was a lesbian. how do u do that
HARUHI: online buddy. you guys never knew who each other was until you met in person, texted each other, and ur phones went off at the same time
HARUHI: you guys knew each other in the past life. nothing’s changed honestly...except in one of her lives she had a normal human family, and she pretends it doesn’t bother her that she knows she’s lost them forever
Under the cut are short writing prompts to help you flesh out your muses or help you formulate plots. There’s no minimum word count, but keep in mind that text posts (including answers to these prompts) only count as activity if they’re 150+ words. If you have a multimuse account, remember to tag it accordingly; and if you’re sending to a multimuse account, remember to indicate which muse you’re asking responses from!
