Unbound: Jin Hates Libraries (1/7)
Jan. 1st, 2012 04:18 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
maayacolabackupLibraries, for Jin, are where fun goes to die.
When Jin had chosen the career of a pop musician, forsaking extended schooling, studying, and books in general, he’d never expected to be forced into a library, for the purpose of ‘reading-that’s-not-comics’, ever again. He reads English books, sometimes, but that’s for fun—he likes being able to understand the lyrics to his favorite rap songs, and he mostly studies his English in random Los Angeles nightclubs, trying (and often failing) to pick up chicks.
Jin swallows with intimidation when he looks around the library, filled to the brim with shelves and shelves of books from floor to ceiling-- books of various shapes and sizes and ages. It’s an old library, one that Shige had apparently recommended to Ryo, who’d recommended it to Pi who’d then recommended it to Jin when word had come down along the grapevine that Jin had to do research for his new movie. The books are so numerous that the library looks animate; a scary, skulking behemoth of knowledge just waiting for Jin to turn his back so it can bury him alive. The uppermost shelves are covered in dust, and ladders slope up the sides of the shelves to allow access to those higher placed tomes, but the ladders look, to Jin, rarely used.
It’s cold in here, too, and Jin wishes he’d brought a jacket or a sweatshirt or a space-heater or something, because the last thing he needs is to freeze his balls off in this already ill-fated venture into lands unknown.
“This is not how I planned on spending the last day of my visit home to Japan,” Jin mumbles. “Why can’t someone else do the research and write a, like, four sentence summary of what life was like during the ‘Ronin War’ or whatever.”
Yamapi smacks him on the back of the head. “Dumbass,” Yamapi says. “It’s the ‘Ounin War’.” Yamapi shakes his head in feigned dismay. “It even has your name kanji in it, you complete waste of air.”
“Don’t be mean to me,” Jin whines, pressing closer to Yamapi’s side as if Yamapi can protect him from the books. “You know history isn’t really my thing.”
“What is your thing, exactly?” Yamapi teases, and Jin, who’s standing so close that he can feel the amused shaking of Yamapi’s shoulders where they brush Jin’s own, scowls darkly at him. “I’m just kidding, Jin. I know you’re more of a music and dance person.”
“I am,” Jin says. “I just…my attention span isn’t built for things like this. My attention span is built for learning three minutes of choreography, and for watching one minute long videos on YouTube of cats on slides.”
“History isn’t really my thing either. You should have asked Kame for help, not me. He loves this shit,” Yamapi says with a wry smile. He wraps an arm around Jin’s shoulder, pulling him closer. “Samurai and traditional culture and things like that.”
Yamapi’s hand toys with the end of Jin’s shirtsleeve, brushing the skin of Jin’s arm every once in a while in a way that always calms Jin down. Jin’s not sure why, because it kind of tickles and he hates being tickled, but he figures it’s because Yamapi is always so calm that his mere presence is enough to make Jin feel calmer too.
“I could have asked Kame to help,” Jin agrees. “But I value my sanity.”
“What do you mean?” Yamapi asks. “Kame has that fantastic work ethic, and he’s very passionate about history.”
“Exactly,” Jin says. “It would have been just like the time I asked him to help me pick out a gift for my ex-girlfriend. There were flow-charts, Pi. Do you hear me? Flow-charts. And then there are those looks…”
“The ones where he slides his glasses down the bridge of his nose and stares at you like you’re a small child?” Yamapi says, with the air of a man whose heard this rant before.
“Yeah,” Jin says. “And granted, when I actually care about something, Kame is totally the guy to call.”
“Yeah, when it’s something like presents, and not, you know, your job,” Yamapi says sarcastically, and Jin quickly nods, feeling justified in his explanation.
“Right,” Jin says, and Yamapi sighs, squeezing Jin’s upper arm one more time before letting go. Jin immediately misses the warmth of that arm, the library’s chill starting to sink back in. “Damn, why is it so cold?”
“Well, let’s get this over with,” Yamapi says, and Jin beams at him, even as he shivers.
“See, that’s the attitude I’m looking for,” Jin tells Yamapi, as they both walk toward further past the lobby. “You’re less of a rebel than me, so this will get done, but you’re about as excited to be here as I am, which means we won’t be here all day and night while you wax rhapsodic about the importance of the ‘Ronin War’ on history—“
“’Ounin War’, Jin, jeez.” Yamapi runs a hand through his hair, and Jin wants to laugh because now Yamapi’s hair is all askew. His bangs are too long, and without hairspray they fall into his face. “Don’t be in movies you can’t even remember the time-frame of.”
“I can remember the time-frame,” Jin responds. “The time-frame is ‘BJ’.”
“Blow jobs?” Yamapi asks, and Jin sighs and wraps a tiny curl of hair around his index finger and tugs.
“Before Jeans,” Jin corrects. “When men wore dresses and had awesome swordfights in them. “ Jin pouts at Yamapi, letting his lower lip stick out just a little for emphasis.
“Bakanishi, the traditional clothing of our people is not the same thing as a dress,” Yamapi lectures, socking Jin in the arm, which makes Jin grin mischievously. “You don’t even think that. Why are you so silly?”
Yamapi sounds a little annoyed, but Jin knows he’s pretending. Yamapi always pretends to be annoyed when Jin goofs around, but he knows Jin, and he knows that this is Jin’s way of making things he doesn’t want to do more fun.
“This place is creepy,” Jin says, and Yamapi looks like he wants to agree with him. It’s way too dark, considering it’s only eleven in the morning, and the whole lobby is eerily quiet. Jin hates that he can hear his own footsteps—it makes him feel like he’s intruding into some sacred place, or like someone died in this library, and it’s kind of scary, like haunted houses, which Jin also hates. “There’s no one else here.” It’s almost true—there are two women bent over an old looking tome at a table near the entrance, and Jin thinks he might have seen a middle-aged guy wandering around in the shelves at some point.
“Focus, Jin,” Yamapi says, but there’s no consternation in his voice, and Jin can tell he’s a little freaked out by the gloomy atmosphere as well.
“I don’t even know where to start,” Jin says, and it’s true—the last time he was in a library has to have been during some photo-shoot forever ago with a suit and a pipe, and he hadn’t faced the prospect of really using it, then. “Like, how do we even find the type of books we need? There are so many of them.”
“Have you seriously never used a card catalogue before?” Yamapi asks, and he scopes out the library, looking for something.
“Look,” Jin says. “I’m far from stupid, but this just isn’t my scene. I just look shit up on Wikipedia if I want to know. Or Urban Dictionary.”
“I know, I know. It’s just crazy to me that you don’t know how to use a library.”
“Not all of us were super invested in our education,” Jin says frankly. “And to be honest, I barely went to school in junior high school. Too busy, you know? I don’t enjoy this kind of stuff.”
“Yeah,” Yamapi says. “It’s fine, Jin. You don’t have to defend yourself to me. It’s me.” Yamapi gives Jin a lopsided grin that makes Jin feel warm and content, even though he has to do what basically amounts to homework.
“Thanks,” Jin says, awkwardly shuffling. “For coming with me.”
“Well, I wouldn’t want to leave you in Kame’s all-too-capable clutches, would I?”
Jin chuckles, loudly, then rapidly covers his mouth. Jin had read a sign, on the way in, that had warned that silence in the library was preferred, and that if you had to talk to keep it on the lower end of the volume scale. Yamapi rolls his eyes, for what feels like the fiftieth time today, and Jin, if his hands weren’t so busy holding in all his sounds, would hit him for it.
“What can I do for my two noisiest patrons?” Says a voice from behind them, and Yamapi spins around in time with Jin as they both turn around to see who’s talking. “Can I help you find something?”
The man is old, his face covered in wrinkles and his head not covered with anything at all, only a few white wisps around the temple to suggest the memory of hair. He’s smiling, and Jin can see that he’s lost quite a few of his teeth to age. He’s wearing a strange suit, and it looks out of date to Jin, like something he sees people wearing in those old family pictures from the 1930s that his mom insists on showing him of some white guy he’s supposedly distantly related to. Jin figures this guy is probably just as ancient, though, so maybe he just doesn’t like to buy new clothes.
The old man clears his throat, and Yamapi startles next to Jin. Jin shifts a little closer to him, and presses their arms together from shoulder to elbow, and Yamapi settles. “We’re looking for the card catalogue. Where are your computers?”
“No computers here, sonny,” the old man says, and laughs at Yamapi’s perplexed expression. “We’re barely wired for lights.”
“I noticed,” Jin mutters, and the old man turns a sharp, red-veined eye to look at him. Jin feels chastised, like he’s gotten caught with his hand in the cookie jar. “Sorry,” he says balefully, and the old man turns back to Yamapi. It makes Jin bristle, but he’s not jealous of Yamapi being on the receiving end of the old man’s attention.
“I preferred the lanterns, myself, but you know, management.” The man rubs his hands together, and Jin notices the swollen joints of his knuckles. It makes Jin rub at his own; he can’t seem to stop cracking them, and he wonders if that’s what will happen if he can’t kick the habit.
“So…Where’s the card catalogue then? The manual one, with like, index cards or whatever,” Yamapi says, sliding his thumbs through his belt loops, which makes his elbow dig into Jin’s side. Jin suppresses his automatic giggle at the weird ticklish feeling.
The old man turns to glare at Jin anyway, and Jin might hate him a little. Then the old man takes his index finger and taps it to his head. “Right here,” he says. “So let me ask again. How can I help you?”
Yamapi looks at Jin, and Jin stares back at him, shrugging. Jin doesn’t know the first thing about how libraries work, so he doesn’t know if this is normal or not. The way Yamapi is looking at him, he assumes it isn’t, but hell if Jin knows what to do.
“My friend is looking for some information on the ‘Ounin War’,” Yamapi says. “Just general things, but focusing more on the historical figures. Like, maybe legends and stuff, too?”
“Ahh,” says the old man. “Do you want to start with the history, or the legends?”
“The legends,” Jin blurts out before Yamapi can make this some sensible trip to the library. “Definitely the legends.”
Yamapi’s eyes are less disapproving and more amused as he looks at Jin through the corner of his eye, and Jin struggles to keep a straight face. “That’s fine,” Yamapi says.
“Then you’re going to want to head to the back,” the old man informs them. “Aisle thirty-seven.”
“Thank you very much,” Yamapi says, with a small bow.
“Thanks!” Jin chimes in, and when Yamapi glares at him, he offers a bow too. Jin forgets, sometimes, that he’s in Japan, especially when he’s out of his element—a feeling he associates with being in the United States, not here, in the land of his birth. Jin sometimes wonders if there’ll ever be a place he feels a hundred percent comfortable. Maybe there’s just something wrong with Jin and it’s got nothing to do with places at all.
Yamapi grabs Jin’s elbow and starts dragging him along, the soles of Jin’s lime neon sneakers dragging along the marble as Jin struggles to pull his elbow free. “Let go, you freakishly strong—“
“Oh, and boys?” They turn around at the echoing of the man’s voice in the large room. It makes Jin feel nervous, the tone of the old man’s voice, like he’s done something wrong already even though he’s not so much as thought about touching a book. “The books on the top shelves are off-limits. Do not, under any circumstances, touch anything along the top shelves.”
“Of course, sir,” Yamapi says, and Jin crosses his arms.
“You might get an unpleasant surprise,” the man warns, and Yamapi nods.
“I understand, sir.”
The old man looks at Jin like it’s not Yamapi he’s worried about, but Jin doesn’t pay him any attention.
“What’s the point of having them in the library if you can’t look at them,” Jin hisses, once they’ve walked far enough away from the man that Jin can no longer feel the old man’s beady eyes creeping along his spine. “That’s stupid.”
“You’re stupid,” Yamapi says. “It’s not like you were planning on reading them.”
“So?” Jin says. “It’s the principle of it.”
“This is a private library, not a public one, though,” Yamapi tells Jin, and Yamapi’s bangs fall into his eyes as he speaks. Jin reaches up and pushes the chestnut strands out of the way. Yamapi doesn’t blink, just keeps talking. “So maybe you need, like, special permission to access those books.”
“Lame,” Jin says, blowing his own hair out of his face, before he reaches up and repositions his cloth headband to hold it back again. “They’re just books. What’s the big deal?”
“Maybe they’re fragile, or something,” Yamapi replies, as he counts the shelves. “Stop here, this is the thirty-seventh.”
“Why aren’t they labeled?” Jin asks.
“Jin, I don’t know. This isn’t my library, one that I personally designed solely to confuse you. So stop whining at me.”
“Sorry,” Jin says, chastised. “I guess we should, I don’t know, choose some books.” He sidles up to Yamapi, and rests his head on Yamapi’s shoulder. Yamapi looks down at him, eyes narrowed. Jin can see that his nostrils are flared, which means he thinks Jin’s being a grade-A nuisance. Jin flutters his eyelashes. “Forgive me?”
“Batting your eyelashes at me isn’t going to work Jin. I am not your mom,” Yamapi says in a low voice, but already the red tinge of annoyance is fading from his neck and Jin can see his lips twitching ever so slightly.
“It totally is going to work,” Jin whispers back, and Yamapi shrugs Jin’s head off his shoulder.
Jin cranes his head back, to look at all the books along the aisle. There must be hundreds, Jin thinks, but for some reason, his eyes keep gravitating to the top shelf. Jin doesn’t know if it’s because they’re forbidden, but suddenly, those books are the only ones that seem remotely interesting. There’s one in particular that looks exceptionally inviting, like it’s calling to him. Jin thinks his eyes are playing tricks on him, because it seems to be glowing. When Jin blinks, twice, and pulls his thick, black-framed glasses off of his face to clean the lenses, the glow around the book seems to disappear. He sets his glasses back on his nose, and squints up at it. “Hmmm,” he says.
“What are you doing,” Yamapi states more than asks, as Jin drags one of the dusty ladders along the shelf.
“Don’t look,” Jin says. “I know you hate rule-breaking.”
“Jin, what is wrong with you?” Jin ignores Yamapi, stepping up onto the ladder. It’s really dusty, and Jin lets go for just a second to wipe his hands disgustedly on his pants. He can imagine he feels tiny spiders crawling up his arms, and it’s gross. Jin hates insects more than most things. “The librarian gave us one rule and you can’t just—be careful, Bakanishi!”
Jin reaches up, standing on tiptoe, and grabs the book, and as he does, he can feel his foot slip on the last rung of the ladder. He feels his balance desert him, leaving him windmilling with the book in his left hand and his right hand grasping for the side of the ladder, cobwebs be damned.
He feels Yamapi’s arms wrap around his waist, and the book slips out of his hand, and then they both fall to the ground in a heap, Yamapi grunting as Jin lands on top of him. “You,” Yamapi wheezes. “Are a total dumbass.”
“Are you okay?” Jin asks, pushing himself up onto his elbows so he can scan Yamapi for injuries. “I didn’t hurt you, did I?”
“Your fatness is crushing me,” Yamapi replies, and Jin lightly pokes him in the cheek with his index finger.
“Meany.”
“How am I mean? I saved you!” Yamapi says, and he’s still talking softly, like there are millions of people to disturb in this abandoned library, and as if they didn’t make a ton of noise falling onto the floor.
“My hero,” Jin replies breathily, and Jin realizes that he’s still laying atop of Yamapi, their bodies pressed together, Jin’s legs on either side of Yamapi’s right thigh. It feels awkward, all of a sudden, even though Jin’s woken up in this position more times than he can count, when they go out partying and fall onto the same bed or couch or floor or wherever’s most convenient when they stumble in the door to one of their apartments.
Jin feels, strangely, like he might even be blushing, but when he looks down at Yamapi to see if Yamapi even notices, Yamapi isn’t looking at him at all. He’s looking over Jin’s shoulder at something, and his eyes are wide.
“Jin, is that book glowing?” Yamapi asks, and his voice is still a whisper, but this time it’s filled with what might be astonishment. “That’s awesome.”
Jin turns his head around to look, too, and the book is glowing again, rocking ominously back and forth on the ladder rung it must have caught on when Jin fell.
The glow gets brighter and brighter, and then the book finally rocks off the ladder and falls, landing on Jin’s back. Jin feels this fierce pull, and he turns his head back to Yamapi, who’s eyes look as wide and panicked as Jin’s own must.
“Pi,” Jin says, and then it’s too bright too see anything at all. Jin feels the bottom drop out of his stomach, and Pi’s hands wrap tightly around his forearms, and then Jin doesn’t feel anything at all.
#
Everything is white, like Jin is trapped inside of a cloud. His limbs are cold, and every motion he makes is slowed, like there’s a lag between what his brain is saying and what his body is doing.
It feels like he’s sinking into it, too, like quicksand, and it’s strange, because Jin isn’t afraid. He isn’t anything.
Then there’s a tingle, this rush, as all feelings come back to him tenfold, and then Jin is careening toward the ground, falling so fast he can’t catch any air. Love, curiosity, joy, and fear all strike him as he falls from the white, into an endless blue.
Then he hits something, hard, and it feels like a wakeup call.
#
When Jin regains consciousness, the first thing he notices is that there’s an elbow in his stomach, and a heavy weight on top of him robbing him of air. The second thing he notices is that it’s hot, and that his hair is sticking to his neck with perspiration. The third thing he notices is that the ground he’s laying on definitely isn’t a slick marble floor, not by a long shot: it’s a thick carpet of grass.
“What the hell?” Jin hears Pi grumble next to him, and then Pi is moving, his elbow digging deeper into Jin’s gut and making Jin wince.
“Ugh,” Jin says with a groan. “Elbow.” Yamapi immediately rolls off of him, with an ease that comes from them both have woken up just like this after a night of heavy drinking numerous times before.
Jin feels like he’s been heavily drinking. His head is pounding, and he feels like his brain is fogged—he can’t seem to wrap his mind around anything at the moment, not with the way his clothes are practically plastered to him with sweat or the way everything spins when he tries to move. So instead, Jin just continues lying still on his back, looking up.
The sky is very blue, of what Jin can see of it through the treetops, and the grass beneath him is lush and soft. “Where are we?” Jin says, taking in a deep breath, savoring the way the freshness in the air fills his lungs. It’s not Tokyo air, where the streets are filled with chain-smoking salary-men by the thousands and the scent of exhaust sits thick and heavy in the air. Here, wherever here is, Jin can only smell soil and sun and hot grass.
“I have no idea why I feel like this, but damnit, Bakanishi, this is probably all your fault,” Yamapi says, and he sounds like he might be dizzy as well. Jin reaches out and tries to make contact with some part of Yamapi, but Yamapi jerks away. “You can never follow simple directions.”
“I’m sorry,” Jin mumbles miserably, and sulkily pulls his hand back in to his chest. His arm drags across something leather, though, textured in relief against his skin. He forces himself to sit up, fighting the wave of nausea that rushes over him by curling forward. When he glances to the side, he sees that book, the one from the library, lying between them in the grass. It hadn’t been there when Jin had stuck his hand out, Jin thinks, but it’s certainly there now. “The book!”
“Don’t yell,” Yamapi says, words raspy. “We’re in a library.”
“No we’re not,” Jin says, his voice filled with dread. “We are most certainly not in a library, Pi.”
Jin scoops the book into his arms. It isn’t glowing, but it still feels slightly warm to the touch. In the suffocating heat, Jin thinks, it’s fairly impressive that Jin is even able to notice it. He turns to look at Yamapi, who’s still lying on his side, knees encircled in his arms, and his face scrunched up like he’s trying to pretend this isn’t happening. “Of course we’re in a library, Jin. There’s nowhere else we could possibly be.”
His voice is really calm now, and it’s kind of creeping Jin out because he sounds like a serial killer, or like someone on the edge of hysteria. Like how Kame used to get when Jin borrowed one of his expensive Burberry ties for a formal event because Jin personally doesn’t own any, and then got it dirty by letting the tip fall into things, like glasses of red wine, or just lost the tie altogether at the kind of bar Kame wouldn’t be caught dead in. That kind of calm. The scary kind.
“Pi, I need you to open your eyes now,” Jin says, and to his embarrassment, his voice is wobbling. “You can be mad at me later, but right now I need you to help me think.”
Something in Jin’s pitch must betray how freaked out Jin is, because Yamapi’s face smoothes out, and his eyes flutter open to meet Jin’s. Then Yamapi takes a good look around them, and his jaw drops.
“Definitely not a library,” Yamapi says, and Jin, despite everything, can’t help but snort at the tone of Yamapi’s voice.
“I’ve already said that,” Jin replies, and as Yamapi lugs himself up, he winces. Looking away from Yamapi for a moment, Jin surveys their surroundings. They’re in a clearing, a rather large one. Around them though, are tall, tall trees; they’re Japanese pines, taller than Jin’s ever seen them in real life, and sprawling out into the distance as far as Jin can see. He reaches up to rub his eyes, sliding his fingers behind his glasses to rub at his eyes.
“Why do I feel like I drank a bottle of ‘Captain Morgan’s’ by myself?” Yamapi says. “All I did today was go to the library. I should definitely not be feeling this hung-over.”
Jin pulls his phone out his pocket. The touch-screen is black, even though Jin is almost positive he charged the thing this morning. He sighs, and then gives up on it, slipping it back into his jeans for safekeeping.
“Also, I would never let you drink a whole handle of ‘Captain Morgan’s’ alone,” Jin adds. “Although alcohol seems the more likely explanation as to how we ended up alone in the forest.”
“What’s the unlikely explanation then?” Yamapi asks, scooting a little closer to Jin, facing him with his legs crossed. His hair is falling into his face, and Jin wants to push it away like he usually does so he can see Yamapi’s eyes, but Yamapi still has a bit of glower lingering at the corners of his mouth, so Jin resists the urge.
“Well,” Jin says, looking down at the book in his arms. “The other explanation is that we have somehow been brought here by this magical book.”
Yamapi blinks, twice. “Jin, there is no such thing as a magical book. This is not a shoujo manga, you dork.” He presses tense fingers to his temples and lets his eyes fall closed, rubbing in small circles. If his head feels anything like Jin’s, Jin knows why. “There aren’t even any girls.” Yamapi rolls his shoulders, like he’s working out a knot. “This would be better with girls.”
“Um,” Jin says, as the book in his arms starts to glow again. “About the magical book thing. The magical book in my arms would like to disagree with you…firmly.” Jin thoughtfully bites his lip. “In fact, I think it’s a little pissed you doubt its magical nature—“
Yamapi’s eyes snap back open, and then widen. “Jin, drop it!” Yamapi says, and Jin reacts immediately, throwing the book to the ground between them. “You don’t hold magical books that are glowing strangely up to your chest!”
“I thought there were no such things as magical books?” Jin says triumphantly, and Yamapi isn’t paying him any attention, his eyes fixed downward at the book. Jin looks down too, and watches in awe as the book opens itself. They both lean in together as words begin to write themselves on the page, heads bumping as they both try to read.
“Jin and Yamapi awoke in a clearing in the forest,” Jin reads aloud, and then he swallows around a suddenly dry throat. “Pi, what…?”
“Keep reading,” Pi says, and Jin nods. “The words…Jin, I can’t read them.”
“What do you mean?” Jin asks. “Are your eyes okay?”
“It’s not…a language I can read,” Yamapi says slowly. “It just looks like scribbles to me. Not words.”
“But it’s in Japanese,” Jin says. “Just regular old Japanese.”
“Not for me,” Yamapi says grimly. “So read it aloud, please.”
“The air was fresh and clean, much different from their home, Tokyo,” Jin continues. He leans a little closer, because he can’t believe his own eyes. His hand falls to the page to trace the characters as they appear, the texture of the paper thick and rough, like an old parchment. “As Jin read the Book, Yamapi started to feel a tingle on the back of his neck, like there were eyes watching him. He ignored it as Jin read.” Jin looks up at Yamapi, who suddenly shivers, and then looks at Jin in fear. “’Why are we here?’ Jin asked, and then--”
“That’s exactly what we’d like to know,” says a voice, and Jin and Yamapi jump, startled. Jin sprawls backward and Yamapi tenses in place. It doesn’t really matter, they’re surrounded by a circle of capable-looking men in leather armor with double swords strapped to their waists, wearing helmets that block their faces from view. “What right do you have to be on these lands?” His Japanese is weird, Jin thinks, like people in those period dramas that Jin sometimes watches with Kame while Kame looks at the television with stars in his eyes and plans his next ‘meaningful and historical’ cross-dressing solo.
“Right to be here?” Jin huffs. “It’s a forest!” The wind starts picking up, suddenly, blowing through his hair, and Yamapi’s as well. Jin’s heart is beating too fast, and his stomach rolls. If they were still in the library, Jin thinks, he’d be tapping his fingers anxiously against an oversized desk right now, eyes scanning the words as quickly as possible to get to the point.
Jin’s always in a hurry to see what happens next in adventure novels. He doesn’t have the patience for all the exposition and character development, and he always worries over what’ll happen to the protagonists. Jin wishes, right now, that he could skip to the end.
The man who speaks is wearing armor crafted of dark green leather, detailed in black, and it looks well-worn. Jin wonders what kind of role-playing group he’s a part of—didn’t Junno used to get into watching that kind of stuff online?
“These lands are part of the territory of the Lord of the East,” the man says, and it suddenly hits Jin that he’s not willing to take the chance that these men are, like, cosplaying samurai, or that those aren’t real swords, so he quiets. Yamapi seems to be a step ahead of him, and all he does is scoot closer to Jin, their hands brushing as the men press in closer, emerging from the trees calmly, at a steady pace. “Do you have a writ of passage?”
“A writ of—“ Yamapi pauses, and then he sucks in a lungful of air.
“I’m afraid we’re here on accident,” Jin says bluntly, and Yamapi nudges Jin with his elbow, which makes Jin blurt out the words again in more formal Japanese. Still the men tilt their heads to understand.
“You’re going to have to come with us,” says a second man, in armor of navy blue, who is standing half a step behind the first. “Stand.”
“Why do we have to go with you?” Yamapi asks. “We’re clearly unarmed, and lost.”
“The weapon of spies is information, not the sword,” says the first man, and something about his voice strikes Jin as familiar. He thinks about it, even as the second man picks up the book. It’s no longer glowing, but the man still stares at it in shock, or awe, his eyes the only thing visible within the confines of his mask. There’s something familiar about him, too.
“And they have a Book,” the second man says. “Did you steal this, spies?”
“I’m not a spy for heaven’s sake,” Jin says. “I can’t even keep a secret from myself.”
Yamapi puts up a hand. “I’m sure this is all a big mistake,” Yamapi says. “Let me call my manager, and I’m sure we’ll get this all figured out.”
He goes to reach into his pocket, and a man behind him immediately pulls out his sword, pressing the blade against Yamapi’s neck, and Jin yelps, immediately trying to move closer to Yamapi, which results in his own blade across the jugular. “I guess that’s a no,” Yamapi says, faltering.
The first man, the one in green, steps close to Jin, catching Jin’s jaw in his gloved right hand and forcing Jin to look at him. The leather is rough against Jin’s skin, digging in because the man is holding too hard. He’s staring at Jin, and Jin can see his eyes through the helmet and they look so familiar. The man’s thumb drags across Jin’s mouth, and Yamapi growls, which makes the man’s eyes flicker over to Yamapi. He studies Yamapi as well, and doesn’t loosen his grip on Jin’s face until he’s completed his second survey. “Your face…” he murmurs, and Jin knows he’s pretty but damn, he hasn’t sustained an inspection this thorough since he auditioned for Johnny’s. Jin’s a little surprised the man doesn’t check his teeth.
“What is it?” the man in blue asks, and the man in green steps back calmly. Jin wants to massage his jaw, but the sword pressed to his throat precludes that.
“Tie them up,” the man in green says. “Keep them separate from the Book. We’ll take them back to the compound. The Guardians will know what to do with them.” He rests his hands on his hips, turning his back to Jin and Yamapi as another man binds their wrists and ankles with rope.
“I’m a little mad at you,” Yamapi says conversationally, as Jin is thrown onto the back of a horse, stomach down. “I kind of want to punch you right now. In the face.”
“It’s not like I knew the book was going to do that,” Jin mutters. “You try to not touch the glowing book.”
“Silence!” The man in front of Jin snaps, and Jin feels a little like he felt when he was Junior—a little unruly and constantly in trouble with choreographers and Takki alike for trying to make things more fun. There’s also this…strange pulling feeling in his chest and abdomen, and Jin’s eyes gravitate to the book. It feels like the book is asking him to come closer almost, tugging at Jin. It doesn’t hurt, exactly, but it doesn’t feel good, either, and Jin wants to hold the book in his arms until the feeling ceases. He tears his eyes away with a lurch in his gut, and turns his stare to Yamapi.
Yamapi is not looking at him, and Jin doesn’t know what the hell is going on, only that the ropes are digging into his skin, and he feels like he might not be in Kansas anymore. Jin wishes it were as simple as clicking his heels three times, but he somehow knows it won’t be.
It takes the better part of an hour for them to make it to their destination, and in that time it starts to sink in for Jin that there is no possible way they are anywhere near Tokyo, and that their only hope of getting back to the aforementioned Tokyo is that book, which in the hands of a man dressed up like a samurai, all the way at the front of this…’procession’…or whatever. Also Jin is hungry, and the pounding in his head hasn’t faded— it’s just getting worse from the steady clop of the horses hooves, and he wants to take a shower, because his skin is so sweaty and wet that his clothes cling to him like a second skin, and Jin hates it when his clothes feel too tight. And that pull in his chest is only getting stronger, and Jin is sure it will all stop if he can just touch that crazy magical book. He’s not sure how he knows it’s the book; he just does. It’s almost like he can sense it summoning him closer.
He looks at Yamapi, who doesn’t make a sound, just has his eyes squeezed as tight as he can make them, and his face looks a bit green, like maybe the nausea is hitting him a lot harder than it’s hitting Jin.
Jin kinda wants to tug on a piece of Yamapi’s hair, or pull at his t-shirt until Yamapi’s face relaxes, but that’s impossible for now, and that, more than anything else, is making Jin upset right now. It’s frustrating, and Jin feel like he’s going to itch right out of his skin, and he needs--
Suddenly, what seems like a hundred thrushes burst from the treetops, and Jin flinches, pressing his face to the warm flank of the horse as the party comes to a stop. Jin hears that voice, of the man in green (and recognition is still niggling in the back of Jin’s mind) command one of them men behind them to go look for any disturbances in the surrounding woods that may have caused the birds to behave so strangely. His voice is sharp, like he’s tense, and Jin doesn’t know why he’s so tense when Jin is the one tied up at wrist and ankle and thrown on the back of a horse, with an angry best friend, a pain in his chest caused by a magic book, and no idea where the hell he is.
Fucking library.
“All clear?” The man in green asks, and after several affirmative responses, then they begin moving forward again. Yamapi sighs, and Jin looks over at him once more.
“Sorry,” Jin whispers, and he’s not sure if Yamapi can hear him, but Yamapi’s face relaxes a bit anyway, just the tiniest bit, and only someone like Jin, who knows Yamapi’s face better than he knows his own, would even notice it, but it makes Jin feel a little better. A little more optimistic.
Jin can see, in the distance, drawing steadily closer, a cluster of buildings, with curved roofs and thick columns, and a watchtower, with torches already lit though Jin doubts it is anywhere near dusk.
Now the horse is walking on smoothed ground, and Jin takes a moment to enjoy how the new, easier riding path soothes his head and stomach. They seem to be approaching a town, or a home, or something, because it’s starting to look less like forest and more like civilization.
Not any civilization like the one Jin is used to, with fast cars, skyscrapers, and air pollution, but civilization nonetheless.
The men don’t waste any time, once they cross through some impressive painted wooden gates. There these terrifying stone gargoyles at the entrance, like the kind at shrines that are meant to ward off evil that have always kind of given Jin the creeps. They pull Yamapi down off his horse first, loosing the ropes about his ankles, and then Jin himself is pulled down. The man in green is holding the library book now, and Jin swallows roughly because his need to grab it feels stronger than it did before, like a steady drumbeat in his chest.
“Take them to the old stables,” the man in green says, and the man in blue nods.
“Then to the stables we go,” the man in blue says, and there’s something amused in his tone, and it’s jarring to Jin how familiar it is. It’s there, at the edge of his thoughts, but then he’s being dragged along by the rope around his wrists, and though Yamapi bumps into him as they’re yanked along, Yamapi is unreadable, face closed off to Jin.
Jin and Yamapi are led back, through a U-shaped courtyard, and through long outdoor corridors, and Jin tries to remember the way but it’s like a maze. Wherever they are, the buildings look like the ones at Todai-ji, with the slatted wooden architecture and the slanted Song China style roofs, and even though it looks so old to Jin, the way it’s made and all, the wood itself is fresh and new.
When they arrive at the stables, Jin is overwhelmed by the smell of hay, and not the smell of horses. The stables seem bereft of actual livestock, Jin realizes. When he was filming ‘47 Ronin’, Jin had dealt with a lot of horses, and the scent of the stables, even if they were only temporary ones, were always a lot stronger than this.
“Here we are,” the man in blue says, and he pushes them both into an empty stall. “The unused stables. We’ll be back for interrogation.” The man slams the wooden door shut, and Jin can hear it locking, a simple slide lock, he figures. “These stalls were made to prevent the wandering of war horses. You won’t be able to force your way out. Just sit down and be quiet.”
Jin waits until the man’s footsteps have retreated all the way to the door before he sets to work.
Jin has small wrists. Smaller than the men must have expected, because it’s easy for him to get out of the ropes tied around his wrists, leaving the rope in a pile on the floor. He unties Yamapi’s when his hands are free, and tries to ignore the way Yamapi flinches away from him, like he doesn’t want Jin to touch him. When Jin gets the rope off, he moves away to the other side of their…well, their cell, to give Yamapi the space he obviously wants.
The floor is hard, made of hard packed dirt, and on top of it is straw, layered in a way that makes the heat of the room feel stifling. They’re abandoned here, Jin thinks. He and Yamapi are strangers in a strange land, and Jin doesn’t know how he should be reacting. Panic seems warranted but unhelpful, but Jin doesn’t know what to feel instead that would be more useful.
A part of him still feels like this is all a prank, or a terrible dream caused by him going against his better instincts and visiting a library to do research instead of relying on ‘Ask Jeeves’ like he’d originally planned. That same part thinks that he’ll wake up any moment now, head burrowed in his own arms as he sprawls across one of the pretty oaken desks Jin had seen in the library, or that he’ll come to with Yamapi pressing an ice-pack to his head and telling him he’s such a dumbass for falling off a ladder.
But the clench in his chest…Jin doesn’t think he could have dreamed this up, the way he can sense the book calling him. And even if it is a dream, Jin’s still stuck in it, now, with no idea when he’s going to wake up, and a Yamapi that sits and broods as silently as if he were playing Aizawa.
If this is a dream, Jin needs to rethink all the crazy shit he eats because this has got to be the most imaginative thing he’s come up with in years. He’d had a dream about being eaten by a bag of Doritos once, but that had been way back in 2005, and he might have just been really stoned. This is totally different than that, anyway, because Jin doesn’t ever really imagine a Yamapi that’s not immediately forgiving of Jin the way Jin is immediately forgiving of Yamapi.
“So…” Jin drawls. “What are we going to do?”
“Nothing,” Yamapi says shortly. “We are going to do nothing. Doing things clearly gets us into even more trouble.”
“What do you mean we’re going to do nothing?” Jin scratches at the denim of his jeans, and they’re welding to his thighs in the oppressive heat.
“Just accept that we’re here until they come to interrogate us. They’ll realize we don’t know anything, then.”
“Or they’ll think we’re lying,” Jin says. “Or they’re nutcases in, like, samurai costumes.”
“Even if they are,” Yamapi says. “We don’t want to make waves. We don’t want to make anyone angry, or step on any toes without knowing the whole situation. This…this isn’t Tokyo, Jin.”
“Obviously,” Jin snorts. “There hasn’t been this much open nature in Japan since, like, I don’t know, when was that Kurosawa film…’Kagemusha’, when was that set?”
“Do I look like Kamenashi to you?” Yamapi says quietly. “But yeah, this looks like an older Japan, I agree. Sort of. Like it’s modeled after it, anyway.”
“So don’t you want some answers? Do you really just want to sit here, locked up?”
“No,” Yamapi says. “I would like to be on my sofa, eating take-out Chinese food, watching stupid Arashi variety shows where Aiba does things that are humiliating, and laughingly imagining you in the library with Kamenashi while he lectures you on why traditional Japanese clothing is nothing like a dress.” Yamapi deflates. “But instead, I am here, a prisoner, in a situation I can’t make heads or tails of, with you, because you can’t behave.”
“I guess that’s why I wasn’t supposed to touch the books on the top shelf,” Jin says sheepishly, and the glare Yamapi levels at him makes Jin want to snap a photo with his iPhone and show it to anyone who has ever described Yamapi’s face as ‘expressionless’. Jin’s not sure, but the hay seems to wilt with him, shriveling underneath them as Jin recoils from Yamapi’s gaze.
“Yes, Jin, I’m sure it was.” Yamapi sighs, loudly. “We just have to accept that things didn’t go as planned, for now, and wait the situation out. I’m sure by being compliant we’ll have more leeway later to figure out all the answers.”
“Accept?” Jin says. “Do you even know me?” Jin crosses his arms. “Why do you always just accept things,” Jin says bitterly. “’That’s the way it is,’ or ‘We have to follow the rules.’ You’re like a broken record sometimes.”
“Jin, we’re locked in. We’re trapped. There is no way out.” Yamapi says softly, face buried in his palms.
“Then we find a way out,” Jin says. “We don’t have to stay trapped. If a situation is bad, we figure out how to fix it.” Jin stands up, moving away from Yamapi to examine the wooden door to their prison, fingers running all along it, before he starts checking the wall, too. His eyes catch on a space between the divider and the ceiling. There are two of them, and Jin thinks just maybe… “Yamapi!”
“They told us to sit down and shut up,” Yamapi says, his voice almost inaudible.
“Sometimes rules are meant to be broken,” Jin says teasingly, and Yamapi suddenly growls, clenching his hands into fists, and Jin recoils. The air seems to drop in temperature as Jin pulls back, and Jin thinks it actually might have, because Yamapi tilts his head to the side curiously, and his balled fists loosen up a little as he speaks.
“Don’t you lecture me about being a rebel,” Yamapi mutters. “I know that’s been your thing for awhile, not being anyone’s puppet or whatever, but…If you had followed one, stupid little rule, we wouldn’t even be in this situation in the first place. So forgive me if I’m not interested in your little speech about fighting the establishment right now.” Yamapi runs a hand through his hair anxiously. “So sit down and shut up.”
Jin swallows, sucking his lower lip into his mouth. Yamapi, for all his sharp words, looks defeated, shoulders curled forward and head bent down, like he’s trying to find all the answers in his white tennis shoes. Jin doesn’t know if he’s seen Yamapi like this in years; his best friend is always quietly confident, sometimes loud and silly with his friends, but always in control. Now he looks a little lost. Jin doesn’t like it.
It reminds him of tear-tracks and broken families and hiatuses, which are all the sorts of things Jin hates to think about.
Jin shuffles until he’s standing right in front of Yamapi, and then squats down so he’s at eye-level with Yamapi’s bowed head. He pokes him in the shoulder, and Yamapi swats his hand away, so Jin pokes him again. Yamapi again tries to push away Jin’s hand, but Jin wraps his fingers around Yamapi’s wrist, trapping it. Jin closes his fingers tight enough that Yamapi would have to hurt him to get free, and Jin knows Yamapi won’t do that.
Yamapi lifts his head to glare at Jin half-heartedly, and Jin clears his throat. “Look,” Jin says. “I’m not always right.” Yamapi snorts, and Jin takes that as encouragement, even if he thinks Yamapi might be implying that Jin is never right. “Sometimes I do silly or stupid things. And yeah, if I had followed the rules in the library, we wouldn’t be here right now. And I’m sorry about that. I am.” The stall, if possible, feels hotter again all of a sudden, as if it’s heating up in tangible degrees in correlation with Jin’s earnestness.
Jin lets go of Yamapi’s wrist, but Yamapi keeps looking at him, catching Jin’s gaze. Jin feels like Yamapi is looking through him somehow, his sweaty bangs hanging in his eyes again, and now Jin doesn’t hesitate to push them back. Yamapi’s brow is furrowed, like it always is when he’s upset, but his mouth is relaxed, so Jin keeps talking. “But now isn’t the time to follow the rules, either,” Jin says. “We can’t just sit here and wait for them to decide what to do with us.”
Jin can’t wait, period. The book is yelling at him now, and Jin can practically hear it, demanding that Jin come and find it.
Yamapi exhales, slowly, and Jin rests his hand on Yamapi’s knee, toying with the seam of Yamapi’s cotton shorts. Yamapi sighs and tugs Jin down next to him, pulling Jin closer so he can lean his head on Jin’s shoulder. “So what should we do, then?” Yamapi says, and he doesn’t sound angry anymore, just…empty, like he doesn’t have any ideas.
Jin closes his eyes and takes a deep breath, and the feeling’s still there, throbbing and insistent, like something is pulling on him, trying to drag his insides somewhere whether his outsides come along or not. “There’s this feeling,” Jin says. “This tugging feeling in my stomach… “
Yamapi tilts his head so he can look at Jin, and though Jin doesn’t turn, he can feel Yamapi’s eyes on his face.
“Like, telling me we have to go. Where we have to go.” Jin anxiously rubs his hands on his thighs again, the denim rough under his palms. “I know that sounds crazy,” Jin says. “I know that.”
“It does,” Yamapi replies. “It sounds really insane, Bakanishi.” Jin sighs, and scratches at the shell of his ear. “But I guess it doesn’t sound any crazier than stumbling into some magical world after having a library book fall on you.” Yamapi slings an arm around Jin’s back, hand coming to rest on Jin’s waist, and Jin leans his head down on Yamapi’s, pieces of Yamapi’s chestnut colored hair sticking to Jin’s lips and nose.
“So will you trust me?” Jin asks, and Yamapi drops his arm and stands up, before offering Jin a hand. Jin grabs it, and Yamapi hauls him to his feet.
“I guess so,” Yamapi says dubiously, but a smile plays around the edges of his mouth. “But honestly, the last time we followed your stomach we ate our weight in takoyaki, and I’m on a very strict diet these days.”
“Shut up,” Jin says, blushing. “It’s not my stomach, exactly. More like my gut. Like intuition, or something. You know?”
“Well, intuition or not,” Yamapi says, frustratedly moving his hair and pulling it back with the ponytail holder he keeps about his wrist, “we’re still trapped in this stall. It’s pretty much escape proof.”
Jin smiles, broadly, and Yamapi looks at him with both eyebrows raised, demanding an explanation for Jin’s expression. “Maybe for normal people,” Jin says, and Yamapi looks intrigued, dipping his hands into his pockets and giving Jin his full attention. “But we’re not normal people. We’re Johnny talents.”
Yamapi studies him for a moment, before he holds out his hand for their secret handshake.
Jin’s been on edge, but now that Yamapi is back in his corner, he feels a lot more optimistic.
#
Jin remembers a time in his life where he had felt a lot more like a circus performer slash trained monkey than like a musician. Being a Johnny’s idol is more than singing, and more than dancing—it’s also about hamming it up for the cameras, doing back flips, making jokes, pretending to be gay with your band mates… and all sorts of other stuff that Jin’s hated ever since he got old enough to appreciate his privacy.
Jin just wants to make American style pop music—something that doesn’t sound as dated as Japanese pop music tends to sound, something that reminds Jin of his favorite music to listen to, like the Black Eyed Peas or like Lil’ Wayne or Nicki Minaj. And sometimes, yeah, he wants to dance. But Jin was quite happy to leave the gay and the gymnastics behind him when he ‘graduated’ from KAT-TUN.
Now though, as Jin contorts his body to fit through the space between the wall and the ceiling, he smugly thinks to himself that he’s still got it.
“So explain this plan to me again,” Yamapi says breathlessly from the ground, as he supports half of Jin’s body weight as Jin shimmies and squeezes through the gap.
“I get through here, and then I unlock this thing from the outside.” Jin wheezes. “I’m pretty sure it’s just an iron slide-lock. I heard the sound it made when that guy closed it…”
“Why is your memory always so good for things that are unnecessary and or criminal, but you don’t know the words to songs you’ve been singing for five years? Bakanishi.”
“Not so unnecessary now, right? “ Jin would smile if he wasn’t concentrating on what every other muscle in his body is doing at the moment. Once he gets his head and shoulders through, the rest will be a piece of cake. “Almost.”
“Why are you the one slipping through?” Yamapi asks, a little petulantly. “You couldn’t even lift yourself up there.”
“Exactly,” Jin says. “Fat jokes aside, as funny as they are,” Jin says the last bit sarcastically. “You’re buff and I’m lean. It’s a small space. You wouldn’t even be able to get your bicep through this space.”
“Fine,” Yamapi says gruffly, but he sounds mollified. Jin rolls his eyes, even as he successfully slips into the other stall. “I suppose it is true that I’m way more ripped than you are.”
“Yes!” Jin says, and then he loses his balance and falls to the ground, unable to stop the loud screech that he emits as he falls on his ass and hits the ground.
“Alive?” Yamapi says, as Jin moans and rubs at his sore tailbone. “Sounded like quite the fall, Johnny boy.”
“Shut up,” Jin mutters, standing up and dusting his jeans off. A triumphant grin breaks across his face, though, when he sees the open swinging door of this stall, offering freedom to Jin. “It’s open!” Jin says happily, and Yamapi sighs with relief.
“Great,” Yamapi says. “Then let me out!”
Jin darts out the door and examines the lock to Yamapi’s prison. As he’d thought, it’s just a simple sliding bolt lock, and he pulls, and the door swings open. Jin stands there with his hands on his hips, and a smile that feels kind of jaunty on his face, and examines Yamapi, who is waiting with arms crossed and a burgeoning grin of his own. “I have come to save you, my lady.”
“Whatever, Jin,” Yamapi says. “Let’s get out of here.”
All of a sudden, Jin feels like doubling over at the tug on his insides. He reaches out for something to hold onto, and his hand finds a wooden support beam. Under his hand, tiny little icicles form, but Jin doesn’t think about it for now. There’s enough weirdness going on without it. Yamapi rushes to his side, too, wrapping his arm around Jin’s waist.
“What’s wrong, Jin?!” Yamapi asks frantically, and Jin holds up his index finger as he tries to suck in a lungful of air. “Your skin is like ice.”
“We’ve got to move,” Jin gasps out, and Yamapi’s fingers tighten, digging into Jin’s flesh.
“Why? What’s happening?” Yamapi’s voice is tight, like he’s keeping it carefully modulated and even with only the barest dregs of will. Jin guesses this little adventure has worn them both down already. Jin hopes they can just get that damn book and go home. The first thing Jin wants is a Asahi Genuine Draft. The second thing he wants is five more Asahi Genuine Drafts.
“The book,” Jin says, straightening as the tension passes. “The book wants me to come get it.”
“It has feelings. Right.” Yamapi says, his voice flat.
“I asked you to trust me,” Jin says, looking Yamapi dead in the eyes. “Can you?”
“Of course,” Yamapi shoots back. “Doesn’t mean I’m not going to tease you, though.”
Jin’s got a comeback, he totally does, but the book chooses that moment to tug on him again, and Jin is wincing despite his best efforts to hide it. Jin’s always been terrible with pain—he definitely cried for two hours after he got his belly button pierced, and only Reio offering him a quart of ice-cream with wide, watery eyes was able to dry up those tears.
Yamapi doesn’t have ice-cream, but Jin’s older now, and he straightens up on his own, forcing a grin onto his face as Yamapi’s eyes drill into him. His knees feel wobbly, a little, and his stomach feels like it’s curling and shriveling up in his belly. He needs to find the book. Soon. “That’s it,” Yamapi says, and he scoops Jin up bridal style. “Which way, my lady,” he says with a triumphant smirk that is only slightly marred with worry.
“I saved you from imprisonment! Like the dashing prince in a Disney fairytale. How am I the girl?”
“I swept you off you feet,” Yamapi replies. “The princess and the Pi,” he singsongs, and Jin can’t help but laugh.
“I’m like Mulan then,” Jin says. “Kicking ass and taking names.”
“Sure,” Yamapi says easily. “So Mulan, where is the magical book that is chewing up your insides?”
Jin closes his eyes and concentrates. He can sort of… visualize the connection between himself and the book, and it’s like a thin line from his belly button out of the stables, glowing a faint orange. “We need to get out of here first, because I can’t see where we’re going next.” Jin sighs. “As nice as it is to receive the royal treatment, I think you’ll have to put me down.”
“Good,” Yamapi says. “For being so lean, you’re heavy like a sack of bricks.”
Jin socks him in the shoulder and then pretends to draw back with pain, dramatically shaking his hand out. “Ouch,” Jin says, and Yamapi snorts derisively.
He sets Jin down, and Jin immediately starts towards the door. When he reaches it, he opens it slightly and peers out through that crack.
There’s no one in sight. Jin sees that the sunlight is fading a little, meaning it’s late afternoon, not yet dusk, and the sun is no longer at its zenith in the sky. “Why’s it so empty?” Jin mumbles, and looks back at Yamapi. “There’s no one out there.”
“Strange,” Yamapi thinks aloud. “That they would have prisoners and no one watching them.”
“I agree,” Jin says. “Let’s just count our blessings.” They slip out of the door and hover in the shadow of the building as they survey their surroundings.
It’s beautiful, Jin thinks, but he can’t focus on the scenery—the serene and peaceful gardens and gorgeously crafted walkways of pine and maple, and their rich gold-flaked painted ceilings and open walls with only thick columns separating them from the outdoors. “Where to next?” Yamapi says, and Jin closes his eyes again, looking for the orange light. “Jin, don’t go to sleep. Now is not the time for your narcolepsy trick.”
“It’s not a trick,” Jin grumbles. “It’s a habit of necessity.” He rubs his chest and stomach as the nagging pull courses through his whole torso. “I can’t see the orange light with my eyes open.”
“Then keep them closed,” Yamapi says, resting his hands on Jin’s shoulders. “I’ll keep you from hitting anything.”
“Yeah right,” Jin says. “You’re going to make me bump into everything.”
“Why would I do that?” Yamapi responds mischievously.
“Because you’re jealous of how much prettier I am than you,” Jin says.
“In your dreams,” Yamapi says. “Maybe I’ll make you hit things in the hopes that something will puncture your inflated sense of self-importance.”
“Nothing can do that,” Jin jokes. “After all the shit I took for leaving KAT-TUN and pursuing an American career, I’m practically bullet proof.”
“Well then, there’s no point in me letting you hit things, is there?” Yamapi says, almost rhetorically. “You’re asking me to trust you that you have some sort of magical connection with an animate, persistent library book that wants you to find it so badly it’s making you sick. The least you can do is trust me to lead you.”
“I do,” Jin replies. “Trust you. I always trust you.” And with that, Jin closes his eyes again, searching for that orange line. He finds it, throbbing, leading straight from his navel out. Jin walks toward it, blindly, as Yamapi’s hands lie warm and reassuring on his shoulders. Yamapi gently guides him as Jin stumbles forward, occasionally pulling Jin to a stop and pressing them both against a building when he hears a strange sound or sees a person. When that happens, Jin’s eyes flicker open, taking in the fading light and the puzzling walkways.
“We’re never going to find our way out of here,” Yamapi whispers, and then Yamapi swears silently under his breath as Jin stops suddenly, because he crashes into Jin from behind, sending them both lurching awkwardly to the ground. Luckily Jin catches himself on his hands, and he’s able to slap the ground to protect himself. Yamapi barely falls, catching himself on one of the support beams.
“Watch it,” Jin says, opening his eyes to glare mildly at Yamapi, and to both of their surprise, a tiny fire springs to life in between two of the large rocks that line the edges of walkways. “Woah,” Jin says, and then he jumps back a little as the flames lick at his shoes, burning the plastic.
“There’s…nothing flammable there,” Yamapi says. His voice sounds like he’s exceeded his capacity for surprise for the day.
“I wonder if there’s a tiny dragon down there?” Jin muses, and Yamapi hits him upside the head. “Sorry.” Then his gut, again-- it’s tugging, tugging, tugging. “Wait.”
“Jin, what is it?”
“It’s in there,” Jin says. “In this building.” He opens his eyes now, and his eyes go round and wide. “Oh.”
“Yeah,” Yamapi says. “This will be rough.”
It’s the main building, Jin thinks, or one of them. Large and impressive, with closed walls and rich painting-work on the walls and underside of the roof. Jin gulps, but he’s sure. The book, it’s in there. It wants Jin to go in there, too.
“This is all very strange, though,” Yamapi says. “For a huge compound like this, there aren’t very many people. I’ve only seen two or three, and they look more like hired help than anything else. Maybe servants or something, if we think of this as the past or something.”
“So?”
“Don’t you think that’s really weird?” Yamapi asks. “That there are two prisoners here, and there are no guards, and there’s no one wandering around? It’s like it’s a ghost town.”
“It is weird,” Jin admits. He knows Yamapi has a point, he does, but the book is making his blood beat in his veins like a drum. “But I can’t…sorry, I can’t seem to focus on anything but…”
“Okay,” Yamapi says, and he pulls the tie from his hair, and ties a better ponytail. “But we need a plan-- Jin!”
Jin is sure that Yamapi probably had something insightful and useful to say, but Jin can’t stand still to listen. He’s too close.
There are many doorways, all open, and Jin slips inside. It’s all one big room, and Jin feels woefully out of place, with his brightly colored sneakers and his baggy jeans, but it doesn’t matter, because the book is sitting there on a low table, closed. It’s just begging for Jin to touch it.
It’s a sprawling room, with meticulously laid wooden floors, smooth and polished, and incense burns, filling the room with the scent of wisteria blossoms and charred pine. Despite that, Jin’s focus quickly zooms in, until all he can see is the brown leather tooled with gold, cream parchment pages waiting for Jin to flip through them and read. Jin’s never wanted to read, but it feels vital to him now, like the answers to his questions are waiting to appear in front of his eyes in that seemingly indelible black ink, in that language only he can read.
“Jin!” Yamapi says, and he grabs Jin’s arm at the elbow, jerking him back. “You can’t just run into buildings like a crazy person, especially with your shoes on, Jin, this isn’t America—“
Jin’s not paying attention. He picks the book up with trembling hands, and sighs with relief as all the pressure abates. He licks his lips and examines the book. It makes a little trill of satisfaction as Jin’s hands make contact, and Yamapi, Jin notices, is looking at the book with shock. “Did it just…”
“Yeah,” Jin says, and the room seems to shiver in place. “It did.”
“So you are the Storyteller, then,” says a voice from behind them, and Jin spins around, clutching the book in his arms, his heart beating with the pulsing of the book in sympathetic rhythm.
Part 2
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2012-01-03 02:40 pm (UTC)And Jin really is as dumb as MiakaGonna contiune now to... Hotohori? :B
no subject
Date: 2012-01-05 12:08 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-01-05 12:20 am (UTC)I have lots of fun and I love it but damn that real life, it just won't leave me alone and read in peace >.<
But I think I'll be able to finish and comment on the whole thing tomorrow XD
(PS: Don't watch it, read it. The manga versions are usually
more hentaibetter than the anime!)no subject
Date: 2012-01-05 01:19 am (UTC)Oh cool, cause I just found the comic online!! <3
I know this story takes... a long time to read, so I hope you enjoy the rest of it!!! <3 <3 <3