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okalanissolis · 1 month ago

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⌖ ๋࣭ ⭑♚₊🗡 ๋࣭ ᴅʀɪɴᴋɪɴɢ ᴍᴏᴏɴꜱʜɪɴᴇ ᴀ ᴄᴇʟᴇꜱᴛɪᴀʟ ᴍᴀꜰɪᴀ ᴀ.ᴜ.

⌖ ๋࣭ ⭑♚₊🗡 ๋࣭ ᴏɴʟʏ ᴛᴏ ʙᴇ ᴋɪɴɢ ᴀɢᴀɪɴ ๋࣭🗡₊♚⭑ ๋࣭⌖ ʙᴇꜰᴏʀᴇ ᴛʜɪꜱ ᴘᴀꜱᴛ ɪꜱ ᴄᴏɴꜱɪᴅᴇʀᴇᴅ ᴘʀᴇᴠɪᴏᴜꜱ . . . pt. i | | series masterlist

focus on: muni sarang (diane meunier) word count: ~4.1k warnings: language, intermittent Lore Dumping™, mentions of violence, occasional graphic imagery, mentions of semi-main character death

ᴛᴄᴅᴜ (ᴛᴏᴏ ᴄᴏɴᴠᴏʟᴜᴛᴇᴅ, ᴅɪᴅɴ'ᴛ ᴜɴᴅᴇʀꜱᴛᴀɴᴅ) ɪꜱ ɪɴᴄʟᴜᴅᴇᴅ ᴀᴛ ᴛʜᴇ ᴇɴᴅ ᴏꜰ ᴛʜᴇ ᴄʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀ !

⌖ ๋࣭ ⭑♚₊🗡 ๋࣭

lilo's mic: we start this story with essentially a history lesson, to keep you up to date on all of the Complex Relational Lore between all of our characters. also, before this past is considered previous is currently the only part of the story i actually have planned. so. enjoy it, this part of the story will probably be the only part that truly makes complete coherent sense. but, in the wise words of okalani akana in her swag girl era: fucka dat, we he'e nalu.

⌖ ๋࣭ ⭑♚₊🗡 ๋࣭

⌜ i kick a rhyme drinking moonshine / i pour a sip on the concrete for the deceased ⌟

ᴅʀɪɴᴋɪɴɢ ᴍᴏᴏɴꜱʜɪɴᴇ ๋࣭🗡₊♚⭑ ๋࣭⌖

— in hoku city there were three gods that everyone prayed to and, in secret, one power that bound them. supplication for the latter was far more clandestine, whispered and sequestered — in exile, made strange. ʜᴏᴋᴜ, ɴᴇꜱᴏɪ, ʙᴀᴅᴀ. star, earth, sea. the three gods that, when destiny conspired and came crawling, created the refuge of the bay on which hoku city was erected. favoritism named the city hoku when it was nesoi who ruled over land, and bada that, with her heaving oceans, carved the bay. but hoku was a star, and the city fell right beneath it's never blinking truth. it was only inevitable that one would be remembered more than the others, and in hoku's complacency, it would only be fair that bada's volatility and nesoi's jealousy would grow.

the ꜱᴇʀᴘᴇɴꜱ was the intensity that kept the city from eating itself whole.

— serpens, short for the serpens syndicate, was no true god, though certainly you'd be forgiven for thinking as much.

— formed generations ago (eight? six? what did it truly matter when the bones of them no longer existed, long pulverized, buried then exhumed, desecrated, then revered on an altar?) when a woman stepped off of a boat and onto the anticipating shores of a fetal city, barely christened with the name of hoku — the recrowning of a deity once forgotten, now animated anew and worshiped again, a cycle beginning at it's center. she had a dream of creating an empire — a whole world that would bend to her whims, small enough to swallow whole, powerful enough to seat her progeny for millennia — and create it, she had. first as a true business, a coalition of handpicked merchants who would come to rule the city with the foresight of a deified star, the omniscient eye, and the volatility of the omnipresent sea that raged around them. their trade was primarily alcoholic spirits and all manner of goods that could be sourced from the omnipotent abundance of the earth.

in those days, the prohibition had yet to emerge. in some ways, it was harder, more convoluted — byzantine. to hold the stopper on someone's desires is so much simpler when you are the only voice commanding vice. to control the flow of sin is a straightforward, near effortless task when there is only one fount, and you it's supplier.

— generations ago, when the world was less complicated, and the laws held with a velvet glove rather than an iron fist, the serpens syndicate was formed. not yet a godhead, something commonplace and admired. perhaps sharper, then, as it navigated streets it did not yet own and, with lazy skill, intricately wove itself into the desires of the people there. and with time, the corrupting influence of that diety named ꜱᴀᴍɢᴏɴɢ, that which is illicit becomes so much more tantalizing to hold. first it was little things, and then the shadows came to dance closer to their vision, and serpens had no choice but to embrace them or be swallowed whole.

— eventually, the elders of the serpens died and their prestige passed to the children beneath them. markets swelled and companies rose, and other things, still, ebbed with the water and, violently, were pulled to sea. only the serpens was strong enough to survive. only the snake born of sky and sea, tending to the ground beneath, could curl itself into the heart of the city and, triumphant, keep it's watchful eye keen.

and when prohibition came knocking, an unfortunate response to the political fear of a red light district growing stronger than it's keeper... well, who were the serpens to venerate: the gods that birthed them, and by favor, swelled their size? or the lawmen that cowered in fear, clawing at what never belonged to them to start?

— it was an easy choice, the former. and an evident decision for the people of hoku to raise the serpens up and, in their devotion, both conceal and empower them.

— when the prohibition hit, the serpens was headed by the mysterious ᴇʀɴᴇꜱᴛ, eldest of the meunier family and heir to the most vast and impressive organization hoku would ever see. open and inviting by name, but hidden yet renown, envied and feared, by reputation.

it was he who expanded their previous business, opening more hidden speakeasies — nips for the well to do that just needed something to take off the edge, bars for those who only wished to partake in their established addictions, and more clandestine holes in the wall for those that were used to the darker shades and umbra the serpens had long been expected to supply: canned heat, bottled torment, and tinned apparitions of ebullient euphoria.

bootlegging, drug peddling, pleasure dealing, death. the gods could save you from misfortune and lead you from disgrace, but the serpens could command all that sin and vice and all those evils that itched the back of your screaming throat.

— so pray to them. buy a bottle of their greed and spill a drink onto the pavement. the cops would never know if it was you that offered the liquid, or them that spilled it in confiscation. but the serpens would know. they were in every window, on every street corner, just around the block. they would see you downtrodden, and they would appreciate your awe, and they would raise you, when the moment became opportune.

to the serpens, master of all three: the omniscient eye, the omnipresent sea, the omnipotent abundance of the earth.

ᴅʀɪɴᴋɪɴɢ ᴍᴏᴏɴꜱʜɪɴᴇ ๋࣭🗡₊♚⭑ ๋࣭⌖ ᴄᴏɴᴛ.

— ernest was a man that, however paradoxically, lived up to his name. warm. friendly. true. and yet, to those who would interfere with his business and create problems or messes (things less than ideal), he was unequivocally feared. his ire was your death; your mistake his boot on your broken neck, a miscalculation...? something bloody would be trickling into the rust-stained drain, the slow drip absinthe that was distilling into liquid gold in the serpen's hands.

most of the grotesque work — the unrefined, the unsightly brute force — was left to the delegation of ernest's right hand: ʙʏᴇᴏɴɢ-ʜᴡᴀ. a man to be equally feared, a name to invoke misfortune and curse. how the two met was a secret all-too-well kept. one day he appeared: the shadow of a crime lord, the brass knuckles of his right fist.

— even when they became fathers their resolve never weakened, their terror never lifted. ꜱᴏʏᴇᴏɴ, born in august, the daughter of a kingpin's right hand, and ᴅɪᴀɴᴇ, born two months later, the dauphin of a power much larger than the self, a weapon so deadly even ɪᴋᴜ himself — death incarnate — could only fathom the shallows of it's striking blow.

if anything, the rise of the next generation simply made them all the more careful in their planning — more visionary, more cutthroat.

— soyeon was born the eldest, and the shadow in her fathers deeds caressed the hair on her head and worshiped the light in her eyes until they were as dark as all that she would be groomed to do. diane was her opposite and not-quite-equal — someone on a pedestal already raised, above in rank and not apologetic of it... yet.

— when it came to diane — darling of hoku's underground world, devoted of that which sat above — many things would sink in slowly, overtime: eat their way through her thickened skin and gnaw at the tenderness encased within. yet was her eventuality, yet was all that she could not abide, and yet would be the knife pointed at her treasonous heart at the beginning of what lies beyond.

it was her father's fault, if we're to place blame.

after all, was it not him, that, in the giddy delight of having a daughter, suggested to his wife that his progeny should have a name no less witty and ironic than his own? ernest for a kingpin. truth for a crown of deceit. they should name her something cynical — acerbic when you faced it unblinking, bathed in truth. sarang, he said, through bubbling laughter: love, when it would be most impossible to abide.

and it had stayed that way: her second identity, her secret name. the epithet she only used with the closest of her kin, the appellation she only whispered through unsteady breath. sarang. love. oh, how it betrayed her. oh, how it shackled her to the floor of her deception and ever-growing lies.

— daughters of monsters and daughters of men. hoku crawled with them and it was the power of ʜᴏʀᴋᴏꜱ — oath — and that almighty mixture of convenience and duty that combined to draw the fates of diane and soyeon ever close, so they would tangle upon bloom.

after all. when there was an education for one, why should there not be opportunity for both? when there was such rich history between the fathers, why not a friendship and devotion for the daughters?

so knit their lives to be experiences in tandem. cut the cloth so their fraying edges could tangle rather than break. school together, extra circulars joint, assembled schedules with collective goals; if their lives were in constant collaboration and concert, their goals and dreams, too, might coalesce and unify. perhaps their bond would triumph over that of even their fathers and their leverage, in the end, would eclipse all the control and power the serpens had ever known.

— from their youngest years, diane and soyeon were together. it was only natural that companionship should rise, and no one celebrated it more than the demon of hoku and his calloused right hand.

byeong-hwa and his quiet pride (the secret, near half curve of a schadenfreude smile; the confident satisfaction of a brief exchange of half-muttered words). the mastermind of an empire didn't express much, but in his silence was a world of self gratified honor and his daughter and her closest companion were at the epicenter — all he could focus on, all he could contain. his blessings were all skills they would hone to a knifepoint, his devotion a paved road.

ernest, by contrast (a man indulged in his freedom, so high above the rest that he bound those that would not be bidden and answered to only those he so carefully chose), delighted in the two girls with ripe expression and open hands near constantly filled with the tangible, though on rare occasion and most cherished, the cerebral. diane, to whom he gave all his wisdom and wove all of his bleeding love, and soyeon, who he blessed with clairty of vision for all her ambition.

— two fathers, two daughters. and all that to say nothing of the mothers who bore them and ever after rose them up. and for a moment longer than the stasis that holds you at the fear of death, and in am embrace softer than the hands encircling your eiderdown throat, the two girls received all that virtue and knowledge surrounding them, and they were happy.

"i thought your name was diane."

"it is."

"then why does samchon ernest call you sarang?"

"it's my secret name," and the younger girl giggled, flipped upside down on the stairs she would climb like monkey bars, dreaming that this staircase was a freedom beyond one she would be granted at this age, still prepubsecent, a liberty perhaps not reached even in the whole of this life. "only the people who know me best call me that. family."

and for a long moment soyeon just stared at diane. upside down as well, moreso hanging than dangling, too stubborn to admit to the vulnerability in suspension. she looked at the girl beside her — this built in friend, this given companion that she grew to care for more dearly than any other — soft. then... "can i use it, too?"

"of course! i was waiting for you to."

— and it would be only too intimate when such familiarity would rot and envy sink in her teeth — anchored deep with her claws.

— diane was the heir to hoku, and soyeon her second fiddle. a weapon for diane to one day direct, a voice in her ear that could be disregarded or misattributed.

it began in those meetings, almost mock sessions — child's play — where diane would speak her beliefs into action, her desires into assignment, and soyeon would see the heart of the blonde leaping from its place and tumbling out of her uncertain throat. soyeon would challenge her then, the way she had their whole lives, with the counsel she was bred to provide, and her tutors would set their jaws and flicker their eyes.

when she speaks, her word is law, her ambitions reign.

never mind the softness that turned her bile into forgiveness, the compassion and love within her yielding and spreading thick, a knife turned to it's side, indulgence forgetting the edge to favor the spine.

— they were little moments, and the thoughts, though poisonous, petty. diane's tenderness would blind her one moment, and the next she would dictate a torture graphic and bloody to the fool who had dared to break byeong-hwa's good knee. the resources of her station could enable her volatility, but without the fervor of passionate emotion, it was a tendency more likely to dull from lack of use.

and so it was a simple question of fitness — a lingering hypothetical of what if that rooted itself in the dark places where twisted things like to grow, and, by degrees, spread it's uncertainty into the deeper beliefs in soyeon's mind.

ᴅʀɪɴᴋɪɴɢ ᴍᴏᴏɴꜱʜɪɴᴇ ๋࣭🗡₊♚⭑ ๋࣭⌖ ᴄᴏɴᴛ.

— it was a sort of self gratifying joke in the meunier household that sarang could see the truth of people and diane could see their use.

sarang, imbued with love from the moment she was a thought in the minds of her parents (a hope, a joy — something to be cradled and held — cherished, for all innocence in hoku city was fleeting and met a tragic demise) , could always see the truth of someone despite any will to hide — verity and devotion bowed before her: unblinking, unmotivated, bare.

diane was less romantically inclined. she had to be, by nature of her role — her existence, her duty, her reign. she could only see the use of people. it was her only saving grace. if she began to entangle herself in the hearts of men, bog herself down in the histories and vulnerabilities of their lives, it would be impossible to do her work. it would be foolish of her: imbecilic to see the heart of people — to focus on all their love, all their life, all their vibrancy, still bleeding and not yet cold. it wouldn't serve her in the end, and so diane had to let those ideals rest.

— it was certainly a work in progress — this distinction between the two parts of herself.

which was more true? which would win in the end? these were questions without answers, quandaries lacking resolve. who are we really? that which we project or that which we feel tearing us limb from limb, clawing inside out, feasting on our rotting flesh, and undeterred, forever starting again?

— but let us begin here with the duality of sarang and diane. the same person — two different people — the same values, different ideals. diane neatly dissected herself on the daily — crafting identities and electing character (cherry picking the best of her, discerning those weaknesses that fit the narrative, burying those foibles that could not), a vulture that picked herself clean and only consumed that which would not fester between her teeth.

— and when she would go out and into this world that would only see her by degrees, she would often keep another name in her back pocket. secrets upon secrets; lies upon lies. you could never truly know her because you only knew a half, a part, a fragment. when she was old enough to hold her own and old enough to where her educational needs differed from that of soyeon and the two of them on occasion would part only to return again, half changed, diane chose a second friend. a bodyguard, mainly. a protector in name.

— his name was ꜱᴀɴ. a year younger than her, but with a build twice her size. fearless, intense, courageous, genuine. how he found his way into the underbelly of hoku city was a predictable tragedy, a commonplace loss; but how he managed to safeguard the softest parts of himself in a place protected and secure, still half transparent to be seen by the eyes of one so clear as sarang, was his true peculiarity.

it was unsurprising, in the end, when diane chose him to be her armed weapon: her chosen conspirator, her useful friend.

— once, when san was newly appointed, and diane hoped to hide a fascination she had with the softness of humanity, she slipped away from san in the crowd. he'd caught up with her and all of his barreling force of anger burnt into ash when he realized what she stooped over was a stray puppy — still infant, terrified and matted and cold.

"you could take him to the complex. the demon of hoku would never say no."

"i know." and sarang was uncharacteristically quiet, like this was some secret, some vulnerable part of her character that untombed itself and didn't belong here — at least, it was still somehow premature. "but innocence has no place in the serpens. i don't want him to bury himself alive and resurface as something changed."

and they stood there, the guiltless whelp before them, whose only sin was not being loved to the point of sanctuary.

"don't slip away from me again. your father is on every corner of this city and if i'm seen without you and a hint of concern, it will be my head." and it was sarang, then, that nodded her apology and agreed. "you don't have to hide softness from me."

— and it was that sort of understanding, that sort of freedom, that compacted and grew, spiraled and engorged — feasted on opportunity as any serpent might — and became the monster curled in the little demon's lap.

it certainly led them to where they were, now.

— the courtyard of the police academy was simple and no nonsense, by a general rule: bare. but during special events like the one being celebrated today, blue ribbon (with shades from the deepest midnight to the softest powder blue) was wrapped around columns and set to flutter in the mild breeze. whole families sat, poised and proper, in unyielding folding chairs. they clapped politely when names of graduating students were called, and peacocked, beaming, when the name was an honor their own.

diane sat comfortably toward the back, her eyes following police academy hopefuls, then the crowd that so warmly received them, by turns.

san was alongside her, as always, but their conversation was nothing but niceties for the duration of the ceremony — nothing like the conversation they'd had before they'd resolved to arrive.

"why are you so set on seeing the police graduates anyway?"

— establishing a civilian face in the most unlikely of locations. taking stock of who was still trusted with the youngest recruits. finding an exposed and vulnerable underbelly that soon enough, could be exploited, gutted, turned. the police were slowly understanding the profile of turncoat that the serpens was partial to adding to their payroll. it had been soyeon's idea to poach where they were least likely to expect: idealized graduates, still wet behind the ears with nothing of value, yet, but the potential and fire of youth.

there was another younger serpens member hidden somewhere in the crowd, sharp minded ꜱᴇᴏɴɢʜᴡᴀ who ernest, these days, was partial to favoring whenever he needed another mind of judgement than just diane, and soyeon was busy, aiding the few senior members to fill the gaping hole left by byeong-hwa.

(he'd died last fall, days before he swore he'd finally retire. a bad omen, some had said: vengeance and penance would always force the worst to reap what they sow. there had been a few retirements after that, some loyal enough and peripheral enough to be true resignations, some far too close to the trigger to see any reprieve other than what lay on the other side of a bullet and it's ashen powder. they were of an age, it was understood. for some of them, there was no expertise, just liability. according to the laws of the gods, a roulette with fate and a handgun was the most they deserved, and an honor they could rest easy with on another plane.)

at the end of this ceremony, diane would convene with seonghwa and together, they would find the rabbits easiest for the blow. perhaps the girl that few clapped for beyond polite acknowledgement; ever still, the boy with a smothered nervousness in his gait, like if he looked over his shoulder, he'd draw attention to his own smoking gun.

— one of the graduates had a grin that near broke into a boisterous laugh when his name was called. "ʙᴀɴɢ ᴄʜᴀɴ." the row in front of diane erupted into the most fearsome of cheers, and they stood, perhaps to make up for their sitting so far back.

diane stood, too, if only to size up this boy that had made her very ground shake with raucous thunder.

when somehow they locked eyes, it was all her power to not immediately falter.

— when the speeches were through, sarang sat to linger.

she and seonghwa shouldn't leave and arrive at their mutual second location quite so noticeably. even in the hubbub of a graduation ceremony. even on a night the nips were sure to be bought dry with young people looking to celebrate, hiding their illegalities under the alibi of youth.

— she could have moved. anticipated the movements that would wrap her string of fate around her neck like a noose.

she stayed rooted to her spot.

— bang chan, the ebullient graduate from before, came proudly over to his family before long. he caught her gaze, big brown eyes flicking briefly to the muscle beside her, before turning to who must have been his sister and laughing, pulling her into an embrace.

it took less than one whole look for san to disappear from beside her, and when bang chan was done receiving congratulation from his sea of adoring family, sarang — diane — was quite alone.

"hi."

and she echoed his greeting before finding more of her voice. "congratulations on your graduation."

"ah, thank you." and he was bashful, rubbing the back of his neck. "it wasn't anything anyone else hadn't done."

"the whole courtyard burst with applause."

and he had all the humility of laughter. "that was just my family." and he waved to the group of familiars retreating out of the archway, a promise to catch up soon. his smile twisted into something still warm but searching. "i saw you standing, though. we can't have met before; i know i would have remembered you."

and for a moment, there was a sound on the tip of her tongue, sly and smooth, serpentine sooth. but a different moniker tumbled out when she thought better, a contrasting life.

a fake name. chan savored the taste of lies on his tongue.

"are you here for anyone i might know?"

"no," and a half truth was followed with falsehood, the genuinely twinkle in her eye accompanied with a smile she could not truly own. "i came to get out of the house, and this is one of the few places my father allowed — so long as i brought my cousin, of course."

chan's eyes brightened, then. relieved. he pressed slightly closer, conspiratorial, light. "your bodyguard."

"that's the desired affect." a laugh. then here, a half calculating, half hopeful hint. "but a push over. give him money for ramyeon and he'll vanish."

and when he left, it was with the parting wish that he would see her one day, again.

— when san appeared at diane's side as though he'd never left, it was mutually understood that they'd never speak of this bang chan and report only to seonghwa those names easily overtook: cho miyeon, seo changbin.

in the end, nothing would come of nothing and only dust follows dust; those things we do in the space between living and death — where nothing can live and no one can die — are always clandestine but teeter on meaningless. we can only have that which we are given to hold, and if there are no hands in this space of oblivion, and the omniscient eye cannot see, are we held in contempt for the arteries we burst and the chambers we disintegrate on our way to be free?

⌖ ๋࣭ ⭑♚₊🗡 ๋࣭ ᴏɴʟʏ ᴛᴏ ʙᴇ ᴋɪɴɢ ᴀɢᴀɪɴ ๋࣭🗡₊♚⭑ ๋࣭⌖ pt. i | | series masterlist

ᴛᴄᴅᴜ (ᴛᴏᴏ ᴄᴏɴᴠᴏʟᴜᴛᴇᴅ, ᴅɪᴅɴ'ᴛ ᴜɴᴅᴇʀꜱᴛᴀɴᴅ) :

1 - hoku city is a port city where there is currently one major gang at play, named the serpens syndicate. the serpens is an old organization that was started long ago as a legitimate business selling alcoholic beverages. as time went on, they expanded their business to things less than legal, and their control over the port makes them strong and rich.

2 - hoku city recently became a prohibition city though it is not well maintained. the serpens is older than the prohibition laws and has many ways to circumvent the system, though the police force is becoming savvy to their m.o.

3 - the current leader of the serpens is ernest meunier. he has an heir, diane meunier. ernest's right hand man was the late byeong-hwa, who has a daughter, soyeon. byeong-hwa died and soyeon, groomed to inherit his place, keeps ernest informed with the aid of older informants, who are slowly "aging out" of the life of crime.

4 - diane meets bang chan, a recent police academy graduate, when scouting for police officers the serpens will add to their payroll. she keeps their meeting and acquaintance a secret from all others, barring san, her bodyguard and friend.

now onto pt. ii . . .

#if this breaks containment..... uhh..... pls pls pls be distracted by the GREAT world building and emotional gravitas #stay for vibes ONLY if you are not part of the specific group of 4 other girlies of whom i am dedicating this to #thank you thank you if you have questions and ARE one of the chosen four pls feel free to send an ask i would ADORE it #lilo.writing #writing.otbka

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