Squirrel messages up and down the World Tree.
Title: Squirrel messages up and down the World Tree.
Genre/Rating: Humor/Fluff, PG
Pairings: Super Junior: Qmi, Hanchul, BLOFISH!!
Summary: Norse Mythology - Where Zhou Mi is Vedrfolnir, Kyuhyun is Nidhogg and Heechul is Ratatoskr.
A/N: UGH WORLD NEEDS MORE BLOFISH
most genius pairing name ever
Anyways yeahhhh I love Norse Mythology, but I'm not quite the expert. So maybe you might catch some inaccuracies or something, but I tried! XD
--
Life is lonely at the top.
Though Zhou Mi wasn’t necessarily the richest or the most famous--no, not that kind of top. In fact, being the hawk perched at the very top of the World Tree--Yggdrasil--left you with very little riches or fame. Those two things tended to congregate in one of the two places: Midgard [greedy little humans] or Asgard [being a god tends to make you a little more known].
Instead Zhou Mi was left as the little-known hawk gazing out from his perch on the tip-top of the Life Tree. Hell, he wasn’t even a hawk. Maybe it was the nice, monstrous wings sprouting out of his back or his peculiarly large nose that made people believe so, but overall he took on the shape of a Midgard-creature, with four lanky limbs and jet black hair. Actually, he wasn’t even sure if he looked like much of anything anymore--he couldn’t remember the last time he had ever seen a real human. The Top was home, and though Zhou Mi was the single inhabitant, he stuck to his post loyally, watching over the nine worlds below. Not like he could see anything other than their most outstanding features [i.e Asgard’s stupid sparkly rainbow bridge, the big fucking serpent surrounding Midgard, the doom and gloom of Niflheim, land of the dead...].
But that was the thing! Zhou Mi resisted the urge to sigh. Civilization seemed so far away--and it was. All he had for company was the sun, the leaves, and...
“Oi, Seasoning!”
.. and that, too. Zhou Mi gave in and let out a long, mournful sigh as he turned to face the only visitor he had ever had--Ratatoskr, the “squirrel” who travels through all nine worlds by means of the World Tree. He preferred the name Heechul. “That’s Vedrfolnir to you,” he berated. Heechul only rolled his eyes. “Come on, your real name is so shitty no one can pronounce it.”
Like Zhou Mi, Heechul wasn’t really a squirrel. He was, however, bestowed a pair of unfortunate fuzzy brown ears and a giant fluffy tail which only served to amplify the undefined amount of bitchiness stored in his humanoid body. Zhou Mi was pretty sure no “animal” on this tree was actually an animal. Hell, Odin’s horse Sleipnir was probably some beefy dude; Zhou Mi heard it referred to itself as Siwon.
“So anyways, my socially inept friend,” Heechul said cheerfully, beginning his weekly news report and thus snapping Zhou Mi out of his musings, “word is around Jotunheim that there’s a big fucking dragon eating out Ol’ Girl Yggdrasil’s roots down below. What do you think?”
“Um,” Zhou Mi began weakly, “is Jotunheim the place that’s on fire?”
“No, idiot,” Heechul snapped, “it’s the place with the giants. Jesus, you need to get out more.”
Zhou Mi blinked. “Who’s Jesus?”
“Nevermind,” Heechul dismissed impatiently, “so what do you think? About the dragon?”
Someone at the very bottom, Zhou Mi thought. He tried to imagine it--what the roots of Yggdrasil looked like--but he could only visualize the one sight he’s ever seen: thick bushels of healthy leaves, sun-dappled and gleaming with dew, the nine worlds blurry with fog below.
“I want to know what it’s like,” he decided firmly. Heechul gaped. “Um, hello? Proper response: ‘Why the fuck is it chewing up our Life Tree?’ ‘Why the hell is it down there in the first place?’ Notice how your question is not listed. Odin, Mimi, the sun must be getting to you. I knew overexposure wasn’t good--agh, my skin...”
Zhou Mi ignored him. The beginnings of an idea were forming in his mind.
“Say, Heechul,” he interrupted conversationally, “You travel all nine worlds, right?”
The “squirrel” snorted incredulously. “No shit, Sherlock.”
“Sherlock?” Zhou Mi repeated blankly. Heechul waved him off. “Well, anyways, and those nine worlds go down to the roots, right?”
“Uh, duh, ever heard of Hel--wait a second,” Heechul stopped, staring at Zhou Mi suspiciously, “you can’t mean--”
“Please, Heechul?” Zhou Mi begged, pouting, “can you please send a message down to that dragon?”
“Fuck no, what the hell Zhou Mi?” Heechul raged, “he’s probably going to eat me or something--”
“But Chullie!” Zhou Mi whined, resorting to pet names, “I want to know what it’s like down there! Please, Chullie, you’re so cool, if anyone can do it, it’s you. Milky white skin Kim Heechul! I love you Kim Heechul!”
At that Heechul paused and considered. Zhou Mi cheered mentally--flattery gets you everywhere. At least where Heechul was concerned.
“Alright, Seasoning,” he conceded, ignoring the sunny grin splitting Zhou Mi’s face, “I can go visit Hangeng, too, while I’m at it.”
--
Contrary to popular belief, the roots of Yggdrasil were not actually that tasty. It’s unfortunate it’s pretty much the only thing Kyuhyun can eat down here.
Yeah, life is pretty drab, he thinks, chewing on yet another root that tastes suspiciously like ash. Kyuhyun is situated in another one of his food tunnels branching out from his den [that he ate out himself, ugh, it’s good he has an incinerator for a stomach so he doesn’t need to carve out a toilet as well], doing the only thing he can really do down here. Eat. Not that he really likes to, which is why Kyuhyun mostly finds himself either singing or drawing all over the walls, which is why he is also ridiculously thin for a dragon who’s supposed to eat all day.
“What the hell am I doing here anyways?” Kyuhyun groans, his head falling back against the dirt walls of his ‘home’. He wasn’t so stupid as to think he could polish off all of the Yggdrasil roots--the tree needed to die, first, and being the Tree of Life, Kyuhyun highly doubted such a prospect would occur. “I should just kill myself,” he grumbles out loud just for the sake of hearing a voice, reverberating through the tunnels.
“Yeah, I would too if I lived in this dump.” A voice, different from his, echoes back to him and Kyuhyun jerks up so fast he smacks his head on the other side of the tunnel. “Ow, fuck,” he curses, stumbling through the tunnel back to his home den, his heart hammering wildly. Odin, he hasn’t had a visitor in so long--in forever--and how the hell did they get in here when he couldn’t even find a way out?
Finally, he emerges from the tunnel into the spacious cavern that was his home, his pitiful bed of moss revealed by the dim light of the glowing fungi--the only source of light. A girl is standing in the center of Kyuhyun’s room, with long orange hair and--”What the hell is sprouting out of your ass?” Kyuhyun questions dubiously. The girl whips around and glares and he realizes, oh, that’s a dude.
“It’s called a squirrel tail, dumbass. Christ, you’re worse than Seasoning,” he bemoans, and then stares at Kyuhyun with such intensity he starts shift uncomfortably. Kyuhyun lives pretty close to Hel, and the dead are loud so he’s heard them speaking of him--a fearsome dragon always gnawing at the Yggdrasil’s roots, though Kyuhyun’s pretty sure he doesn’t look like one.
Heechul sees a thin stick of a boy, pale but radiant, with soft chocolate brown locks curling at the nape of his neck, dark eyes and pink lips and thinks damn, maybe I should try that Yggdrasil diet, too. But what catches the most attention are the scaly, leathery dragon wings Kyuhyun sports, its iridescent scales gleaming in the dim light as they fold into the boy’s back. Heechul’s somewhat disappointed, somewhat not, but he’s got a message to deliver and a bitchiness quota to fulfill.
“So, dragon boy,” he begins, daintily setting himself down on the only thing above ground--the moss bed--as he begins his introduction. Heechul figures Kyuhyun lives under a rock as heavy as Zhou Mi’s when he first met him--in other words, as much knowledge as a newborn child. He begins with the basics. “I’m Ratatoskr, the squirrel that runs up and down the Yggdrasil. Yeah, that’s right bitch,” he adds, viewing Kyuhyun’s awed expression smugly, “I’ve been places. Anyways, you can call me Heechul.”
“Right. So, uh, Heechul," Kyuhyun begins, “how did you get in here?”
Heechul feels sort of bad as he sees the hope shining in those eyes. “As much as I’d like to bust you out of this shit hole, I came in through Hel.”
“Hel?” Kyuhyun repeats disbelievingly. Heechul nods smugly, because nobody enters Hel and comes out alive--except for him, of course. “Connections, man. Connections.”
Kyuhyun is crestfallen. I should have expected it, he thinks bitterly, before continuing. “And, so, uh, why are you here?”
Heechul huffs, “So, uh, how about a name first?” Kyuhyun bites back a rude comment; this man is terribly bitchy, or maybe all people outside of his little den are like that? Odin, he thinks, I hope not. For the good of the world.
“Nidhogg, but I prefer Kyuhyun,” he mutters, and ignores Heechul cooing ‘now that wasn’t so hard, was it?’, choosing instead to repeat his question. Because if Heechul didn’t have a good reason, Kyuhyun could do with a change in food. Heechul pouts--kids these days, always skipping the pleasantries--but delivers his message like a proper message squirrel should: as accurately as possible. Kyuhyun is extremely disturbed when Heechul’s voice suddenly turns excited and accented.
“Hi! This is Vedrfolnir. Um, if you didn’t know, I’m the hawk at the very top of the Yggdrasil? It’s nice to meet you! Kind of? I don’t think speaking through Heechul counts--oh! But anyways, you can call me Zhou Mi.”
Kyuhyun was suitably impressed by Heechul’s imitation skills: he could hear the big stupid smile.
“So, so, um, living up here is pretty nice! I mean, I wake up every day to sunshine, and, you know the deal with the tops of trees--lots of leaves! Um, how’s life down there? I can’t really imagine it. Uhh.. no sky, huh. Wait, really?! NO sky? Seriously?”
He could feel the beginnings of a frown tugging on his lips. Now it just sounded like this Zhou Mi guy was mocking him. What was a ‘sky’ anyways?
“B-but anyways! Yeah, I just want to know, uh.. how you’re living. Hahaha, must be pretty different, huh? Um, please reply through Heechul! Thanks!”
Kyuhyun is ready to reply as soon as Heechul closes his mouth.
“Well, hey, Vedr--howthehelldoyoupronouncethat--Zhou Mi, nice to hear from you--not. I’m Nidhogg, call me Kyuhyun. Don’t worry about meeting me, I don’t think I could take it. So the top of the Yggdrasil feels good, huh? Well, if you wanted to make yourself feel better, congratulations. My life sucks shit. No, there is no sky, I live in a giant dirt hole. Eating roots that taste like my foot. All day long. Pretty different, I’d agree. Bye. Don’t send Heechul down here again, he’s annoying.”
“Hey!” Heechul protested, though he was grinning. “You know, you’re kinda bitchy yourself.” Kyuhyun rolled his eyes. “Only to assholes who think they rule the world. Now get out of here, or I’ll kill the messenger, too.”
Heechul would have told Kyuhyun that his perception of Zhou Mi was entirely wrong, but as he stepped back into Hel and the arms of a worried Chinese man’s spirit, he figured he could withhold valuable information like that. He was Heechul, after all.
--
Zhou Mi’s facial expression goes a little like this:
Before the message: super excited, grin of colossal size that possibly took up three-quarters of his face.
After the message: utterly crushed, kicked puppy eyes and the saddest frown Heechul has ever seen in all nine worlds.
He dies laughing.
“I--No! I didn’t--I mean--It wasn’t--” Zhou Mi splutters, face ashen. “I’m not a jerk!” Zhou Mi cries at last, his body slumping in defeat. “And my name isn’t hard to pronounce,” he adds glumly. Heechul snickers.
Zhou Mi can only be described as down in the dumps, his great wings [and nose] drooping, lips quivering and how such a handsome man could look that pitiful is beyond him. But Heechul does have some good in his heart. You know, when he feels like it.
“I could clear some things up for you, if you want,” he suggests casually, and almost regrets it when Zhou Mi’s face lights up like the sun on steroids. God of Light’s got nothing on this kid.
“Really, Heechul? Oh, thank you, thank you!” Zhou Mi gushes, eyes sparkling with the chance to redeem himself, the kind of hopeful and happy that makes Heechul want to kick dogs. He wants to tell Zhou Mi that he’s not doing it for him, it’s to see Hangeng again, but neither of them would believe it and Zhou Mi is already blabbering his message.
--
“You know, I’m pretty hungry right now,” Kyuhyun tells Heechul the next time he arrives in his den. He’s not really lying--eating anything but roots sounds absolutely fantastic, but he’s pretty sure Heechul would taste bad. Too prissy. “I thought I told that guy not to send you down again?”
Heechul huffed. “Such a cold welcoming--especially since Zhou Mi and I brought you.. this!” With much extravagance Heechul pulls out from behind his back--
“What’s that?” Kyuhyun asks, frowning. Heechul smacked him. “It’s food, idiot! Real food!”
“Real food?” the dragon breathed, eyes wide. Something not roots? He moved forward, hands reaching out because now that he thought about it this ‘real food’ smelled amazing--
Heechul jumped back, smirking. Kyuhyun felt like crying as his hands met empty air. “Not so fast,” the ‘squirrel’ crowed imperiously, holding smoked meat and Yggdrasil berries above his head like a prize, “Zhou Mi requested you receive these items. So hey, I’ll give you these if you sit and listen to his message.”
Kyuhyun’s eyes narrowed. On one side, the last message Zhou Mi sent was complete assholery. But on the other side, there was food. And Zhou Mi couldn’t be that much of a bad guy if he sent food, right?
Whatever. “Ugh, fine, I’ll listen,” Kyuhyun grumbled, “just gimme the food.”
Ah, yes, bribery, Heechul thought, tossing the grumpy dragon the food, it always works. He cleared his throat.
“Hey Ky--Kyuh--Kui Xian?”
Kyuhyun choked on a morsel of heaven. “What the fuck?” he cried, “How can you get my name wrong?”
“Your name is hard to pronounce, too! But anyways, I’m really sorry! I didn’t mean for my message to come out that way! I’m not a jerk, I promise! Please forgive me!”
It was very surreal, hearing blubbery, whiny sounds coming out of Heechul’s mouth. The squirrel looked pretty disturbed himself.
“Life up here isn’t actually that nice either--I’m sorry I made you think I was belittling you, I just wanted you to think I lived in a cool place! But the truth is, I’m the only one up here. It gets really lonely sometimes, since Heechul is my only visitor. Sorry you have to eat roots that taste like your foot; I sent some berries down to you! I hope they taste better. It’s also really nice to talk to someone else for a change.. so please don’t stop talking to me? Please?”
“End of message.” Heechul proclaimed. “Man, am I a fucking telephone or something? Not that anybody else knows what that is..” Kyuhyun had slowed his ravenous eating, choosing to chew thoughtfully as he considered Zhou Mi’s slightly pitiful message. He swallowed and stared regretfully down at his hands, where there was no more Real Food. “Well,” Kyuhyun started, licking his fingers, “tell him this...”
--
“.. it’s Kyuhyun, not Kui Xian or whatever. Get it right! You’re so lucky you get to eat the berries instead of the roots. And you only have Heechul for company? Tough luck.
... But I don’t have anyone down here with me either, so I guess we’re in the same boat. I can hear the dead sometimes, if they’re really loud, but it doesn’t really count. It gets really boring, so sometimes I.. sing, or write--why am I telling you this?!
Anyways, you’re kind of pathetic.
.. If you keep sending food maybe I’ll put up with you.”
Zhou Mi was positively ecstatic. Heechul watched, somewhat nonplussed as the taller man squealed like a little girl, wings flapping and arms flailing.
“Oh, Chullie, isn’t this great?” Zhou Mi gushed, already reaching for a cluster of Yggdrasil berries, “He’ll talk to me! He told me he sings! Heechul, I sing, too!”
“Yeah, and so does everyone else,” the squirrel sighed, making himself comfortable on a branch as Zhou Mi fluttered about. “I can’t carry that many berries, and I don’t think dragon boy can eat all of those.”
Zhou Mi pouted. “But he’s so.. deprived! Kui Xian said himself the roots taste like feet. But I wonder what it’s like, being so close to the dead--oh, Heechul, can you tell him..”
Heechul groaned. “How did such a finely cultured being as myself become the middleman?”
--
Over a period of a Very Long Time, Zhou Mi the hawk and Kyuhyun the dragon grew closer. Not by distance--no, they were still at the very ends of the Yggdrasil--but through means of a disgruntled squirrel.
Zhou Mi was dumbfounded. He had never heard anything like where Kyuhyun lived: Winding tunnels and bare caverns, dimly lit by glowing fungi that let sound bounce off the walls endlessly. He heard about the mysterious Hangeng [“Yeah, Heechul comes in through Hel with the help of some Chinese guy.. what’s his name, Hankyung or something?”] and the gossip of the dead [“Baldur’s dead? Who was stupid enough to do that?!” "Apparently he was killed by a twig." "..What?"]. He heard about Kyuhyun’s wings, scaly and featherless and how he couldn’t really fully open them without brushing the walls--his confines. It left an ache in his heart, the wistfulness in his words Heechul artfully conveyed.
Kyuhyun was enraptured. Zhou Mi told him tales of a sky, something huge, the brightest blue and wide open. A place where he could soar or glide or do something other than eating. He told him about leaves and birds and a fiery golden disk in the sky, of warmth and wind and freedom. Zhou Mi also told him about sleet and lightning and rain, of the dangerous lack of shelter above but Kyuhyun thinks anything can be better than these unchanging caves.
Heechul brings news and gossip to both of them. He tells them about Tyr’s magic sword [“That idiot--sacrificing his sword for some pretty face?” “But Kui Xian, it’s so romantic!”] and the witch that twisted Loki’s mind, the resulting evil. How Loki’s children were horrid [“I heard Odin took one look at the daughter and chucked her down to Hel! Must’ve been seriously ugly.”] and the general not-good occurring.
Not that it effects the three of them, living in no world but on the World Tree herself, until one day Heechul rams into a very surprised Zhou Mi, who was attempting to make tea out of Yggdrasil leaves.
“What the hell are you doing?” Heechul asks. Zhou Mi looks down at his hands, where he is trying to wrangle ‘tea’ out of emerald leaves and into a dent in a branch. It wasn’t really working. Heechul interrupts him before he can say anything.
“Whatever. Seasoning, Ragnarok is coming! Ragnarok!” Heechul screeches. “I never thought I’d see it in my lifetime!”
“Heechul, we’re immortal,” Zhou Mi points out. “What’s Ragnarok anyways?”
He gapes. “Seaso--no, Zhou Mi, I’ve never told you about Ragnarok?” At the emphatic no, Heechul groans. “It’s the end of the world, you retard! You know, prophesied? Everybody dies? Two humans hide out in our dear Big Tree and start the world anew by going at it like bunnies?”
“What are bunnies?” Zhou Mi asked. Heechul smacked him.
“Never mind that--what do you think? Worlds collapsing and shit. Say goodbye to half of the gods and goddesses.”
Zhou Mi frowned. “I haven’t even met half of the gods and goddesses. And besides,” he added thoughtfully, “does it even change anything for me? The Yggdrasil still stands, right?”
“Fine,” Heechul grumbled, “don’t freak out with the rest of the nine worlds. It’s Doomsday, nothing to worry about. Hmph.”
--
Kyuhyun has much of the same reaction as Zhou Mi, leaving Heechul to pull his hair out in frustration.
“Hermits,” Heechul hisses. Kyuhyun rolls his eyes, scratching aimlessly at a wall. His eyes trail upwards, to the ceiling of his den. Roots twine around each other, emerging from thick earthy ground that Kyuhyun knows he can’t dig out of.
“Heechul,” he says suddenly, “do you think I’ll ever get out of here?”
The older stops bitching to look over at Kyuhyun thoughtfully. “Maybe,” he says, “you’re got eternity to try.”
--
Escape comes faster than he expects. Kind of.
Kyuhyun wakes up to the huge racket next door in Hel. The dead must be having a rave party or something because Kyuhyun can feel his den shaking as they stomp around, their groaning symphony echoing around his den. He’s half-awake and extremely grumpy [it’s hard enough falling asleep on a flat moss bed, and when you finally do? Do not disturb.], so it’s only natural for him to bang on the wall yelling at them to “Shut the Hel up!”
What’s not quite so natural is how the dirt walls start breaking apart, large chunks crumbling down to the floor. It takes a few seconds for Kyuhyun to realize, what the fuck his home is collapsing.
“Fuck!” Kyuhyun shouts, rocketing out of his pitiful bed. All around him rocks are tumbling; tiny landslides of dirt pile at his feet and Kyuhyun hopes he can die by suffocation. Being immortal sucks.
But then God comes in the form of a bushy-tailed pretty boy, and Heechul phases through a crumbling wall. “Kyuhyun,” he says, “I see your home is crumbling.”
“Yes, I see that too,” Kyuhyun hisses, “so get me out of here. Somehow. Like, now.”
Then the Chinese spirit--Hangeng--pops out of the wall, too, and hurriedly gestures for them to go through the rift Kyuhyun has never noticed. Hangeng looks exceptionally worried today, his apparition blurry and frayed.
“In case you didn’t know,” Heechul informs, “Ragnarok’s started and all the dead are marching to war. They’re going to get there by Naglfar--that's the name of the ship made out of the fingers and toenails of the undead. That’s why they’re having some problems.”
“This also means Mistress Hel is too busy to keep track of the no-alive-people rule,” Hangeng adds, “so you’re free to go.”
“Thank God,” Kyuhyun mutters, already halfway through the rift, “get me out of this shit hole.”
Cold air meets Kyuhyun’s first emergence from his home since forever, and he takes in the ranks of undead plodding along to get into a nasty looking ship Kyuhyun can smell from his distance. It’s dank and drab and generally unpleasant, but Kyuhyun figures that’s Hel for you. Heechul takes his elbow and drags him briskly through a series of tunnels and alleys, ins and outs, ups and downs until Kyuhyun emerges into a vast plain, half ice and half fire.
“Welcome to Muspellheim and Nifleheim,” Heechul introduced cheerfully, “now let’s get out of here.”
And then Kyuhyun found himself scurrying up roots he knew very well--Yggdrasil roots, twining and lively as he followed Heechul higher and higher. They passed a place of filled with the hugest beings he’d ever seen [giants, he guessed], a smoking world of smithing gnomes, the roots growing thicker and thicker until--
Kyuhyun emerged into the world of Midgard and saw the sky for the first time. It stretched for forever and on, wide open just like Zhou Mi promised. Enough to hold all of those birds and bugs Zhou Mi had talked about, all that and more.
Heechul punched him in the shoulder. “Stop gaping, you look stupid.” Kyuhyun quickly closed his mouth, but the awed look stayed. Heechul rolled his eyes.
“We’re all meeting at the top of the Yggdrasil. Don’t be late.” And with a flick of a very fluffy tail, Heechul was gone. Scaling up and away on the mighty trunk of the Yggdrasil.
Kyuhyun wouldn’t go that way. Slowly, his wings unfurled, creaking from underuse. He admired how they gleamed in the golden disc’s light--the sunlight--all deep, vivid colors. My wings are so much cooler than Zhou Mi’s. He thought smugly. Feathers are overrated.
Hesitantly, he flapped the leathery appendages, eyes widening as they lifted him of the ground, just for a second before gravity took hold and he touched ground again.
Wind, Zhou Mi had said, and a running start helps, too. Wind is something Kyuhyun has only had explained to him, not experienced, but as strange coldness flows around his skin, threading through his hair and gently pressing him backwards, Kyuhyun thinks he just did. Positioning himself to face the direction of the flow as Zhou Mi had instructed once, Kyuhyun began running. Slowly, naturally, his wings stretched outwards and then Kyuhyun was going up, rising and watching the earth that had trapped him for centuries become smaller, insignificant, and he’s escaped--
Then his wings tilted too much and Kyuhyun was spinning in air, plummeting downwards until he remembered to right himself. Kyuhyun repressed a sigh of relief as the ground grew smaller again. Flying did require some concentration--but it was weightless and free and everything Kyuhyun has been looking for.
He remembers Heechul and spirals up the Yggdrasil, enjoying the feeling of air on his outstretched wings as he goes higher and higher. He spies the rainbow bridge--Bifrost--that Zhou Mi was talking about. There’s a mass of bright fiery giants at the bottom of it, trying their hardest to break the only bridge from Asgard to Midgard and Kyuhyun figures Ragnarok is well on its way. He flaps his wings a little faster.
Kyuhyun finally sees the telltale leaves of the top of Yggdrasil, the way the sturdy trunk finally splits into a million different branches bursting into a billion different bushes of leaves and delicate golden berries, the first Real Food Kyuhyun’s ever had, courtesy of Zhou Mi [after tasting beef and cabbage and apples, he still thinks the berries are the best]. The leaves, bright and verdant, are dense and beautiful, and Kyuhyun is so caught up in admiring a landscape so new and different from his own that he almost doesn’t see Zhou Mi.
It’s a tall and strange silhouette out of the corner of his eye that he pays no mind to until it speaks, tentative and soft but undeniably Zhou Mi, “Kui Xian?”
Kyuhyun whips around so fast he almost falls--this flying business is hard!--and sees his ‘pen pal’, as Heechul calls it, for the first time. He tries to take it all in, the sharp features and sunny smile and majestic feathered wings, that this is Zhou Mi. The man flying toward him, bright eyed and long-legged is the one that told him of sun and stars, whispered to him of larks and bumblebees and life beyond a dim little den, of skies and warmth and open air.
“Zhou Mi?” Kyuhyun asks, though he doesn’t need to, because he already knows it’s him. Zhou Mi doesn’t even need to nod, and they just stay there, in the air staring at each other.
Zhou Mi has never once asked Kyuhyun what he’s looked like, not once in their whole length of communication. He sees a pale, slender boy, not as skinny as Heechul first saw him because he’s learned to enjoy food again but now healthier, with soulful dark eyes and thinks this is what Kui Xian looks like, the sharp-tongued clever boy he’s come to know. He has a picture to the person now.
It’s Kyuhyun who breaks the silence. “Your nose is big,” he notes. Zhou Mi chokes, and then starts laughing. “Thanks,” he chuckles, “you’re not so bad yourself.” Kyuhyun shrugs, and Zhou Mi motions for him to follow as he begins gliding towards the rendezvous point.
“So,” he starts, a little lamely, “how’s new life above ground?”
“You told me the sky was blue,” Kyuhyun accuses. Zhou Mi looks up just in time to see the screaming sun get eaten by a large wolf. The sky is an ugly shade between pitch black and nuclear waste green. “Sorry,” he apologizes, “I guess the end of the world does that to the pigments.”
“It’s fine,” Kyuhyun says, “at least I get to see you.”
When Zhou Mi looks at him tenderly, he looks away blushing and quickly “elaborates”, “I mean, now I know you look exactly how you speak. Like an idiot.”
With an indignant ‘hey!’ Zhou Mi pushes Kyuhyun, who starts laughing and soon it’s just like talking before--except this time they don’t need to wait a few days for a reply. It feels good.
“We’re hiding out in the base of all the Yggdrasil’s branches,” Zhou Mi informs, directing Kyuhyun through a rather inconspicuous entrance into the depths of the Yggdrasil’s canopy. “That way we’ll be protected by a bunch of wood and leaves and get a nice place to hang out in as everyone dies.”
“Cool,” Kyuhyun says. After several twists and turns--the top of the World Tree is a maze of leaves and branches, layers and layers of them--the two emerge into a spacious area, where the wide trunk first began branching off. The Yggdrasil’s branches are sinuous and strong, curving around the clearing to form an impenetrable dome of foliage and wood. Kyuhyun is suitably impressed, or would have been if his attention wasn’t drawn to the two figures already in the clearing.
“Hey, who are you guys?” Needless to say, Zhou Mi is surprised that he and Kyuhyun aren’t the only ones here. Two humans are sitting in the very center of the room, playing something that looks eerily similar to what Heechul refers to as ‘pattycake’. They both whip around, eyes widening, before the spacey-looking one grins and waves enthusiastically.
“Hey! I’m Donghae!” He cheers, and his floppy-haired friend seems to relax and gives a dorky smile of his own. “I’m Sunwoong, but you can call me Daniel, but you can call me Tablo.” They exchange a mischievous look as devious smiles spread across both of their faces, and Kyuhyun has a pretty bad feeling about what’s going to happen next.
Then the Donghae kid performs multiple cartwheels and handsprings to the beat of Tablo’s beatboxing, ending with what would have been an incredibly dashing leap into Tablo’s arms had Tablo not fallen under his weight. Still they had grins beating Zhou Mi’s on the ridiculous scale, hands down, as they jump back up and lean towards each other, placing their right hands and left hands together in what Zhou Mi thinks Heechul would call a ‘FUSION-HAH!’ position as they shout, “And together we are Lif and Lifthrasir!”
Kyuhyun looks too shocked to say anything, so Zhou Mi thinks back to what Heechul was telling him about Ragnarok and asks, “Isn’t one of you supposed to be a girl?”
Donghae shrugs, “We never figured out which one of us was Lif. It doesn’t really matter anyways, does it?” Zhou Mi’s pretty sure it does, since the whole reason they’re supposed to be kept alive is because of the whole repopulation matter, but then he sees them doing a complicated secret handshake involving pelvic thrusts and octopus dances and decides repopulation can lie in the hands of another couple.
“How did you guys get here before me?!” Heechul shrieks, bursting into the clearing with a bewildered but relieved[I don’t have to fight the gods now!] Hangeng in tow. “I wanted to introduce you guys to Blofish,” Heechul scowled, crossing his arms and stamping his foot.
“Blow.. fish?” Kyuhyun repeats blankly, stepping behind Zhou Mi when Tablo and Donghae whip around lightning fast.
“That’s US!” Donghae crowed, Tablo grinning, before turning back to what they were previously doing: playing the modified version of rock, paper, scissors, AKA rapist, policeman, beauty. Zhou Mi grasped Kyuhyun’s hand. “It’s ok,” he reassured, “I’m sure they’re really calm, beautiful people on the inside.”
Kyuhyun scoffed, though his cheeks were pink. “They’re as calm as Heechul is straight,” he grumbled, eyeing Hangeng suspiciously. Zhou Mi laughed, turning it into an awkward sounding cough as Heechul sent a look their way.
“We’ll be alright,” he persisted, smiling a stupid sunny smile, “at least we’ve got each other. Every day now.” This time Kyuhyun doesn’t shoot a sharp comment. He simply grasps Zhou Mi’s hand tighter and smiles.
“Man, those kids are so sappy,” Heechul whines.
“I’m sorry,” Hangeng says awkwardly, “do you want a beer?”
--
A/N: so yeah do you know that one youtube video where heechul imitates everyone’s reactions whenever he gets mad? B)
Also does anyone know how to keep all the italics when you copypaste your story into LJ? ):
Genre/Rating: Humor/Fluff, PG
Pairings: Super Junior: Qmi, Hanchul, BLOFISH!!
Summary: Norse Mythology - Where Zhou Mi is Vedrfolnir, Kyuhyun is Nidhogg and Heechul is Ratatoskr.
A/N: UGH WORLD NEEDS MORE BLOFISH
most genius pairing name ever
Anyways yeahhhh I love Norse Mythology, but I'm not quite the expert. So maybe you might catch some inaccuracies or something, but I tried! XD
--
Life is lonely at the top.
Though Zhou Mi wasn’t necessarily the richest or the most famous--no, not that kind of top. In fact, being the hawk perched at the very top of the World Tree--Yggdrasil--left you with very little riches or fame. Those two things tended to congregate in one of the two places: Midgard [greedy little humans] or Asgard [being a god tends to make you a little more known].
Instead Zhou Mi was left as the little-known hawk gazing out from his perch on the tip-top of the Life Tree. Hell, he wasn’t even a hawk. Maybe it was the nice, monstrous wings sprouting out of his back or his peculiarly large nose that made people believe so, but overall he took on the shape of a Midgard-creature, with four lanky limbs and jet black hair. Actually, he wasn’t even sure if he looked like much of anything anymore--he couldn’t remember the last time he had ever seen a real human. The Top was home, and though Zhou Mi was the single inhabitant, he stuck to his post loyally, watching over the nine worlds below. Not like he could see anything other than their most outstanding features [i.e Asgard’s stupid sparkly rainbow bridge, the big fucking serpent surrounding Midgard, the doom and gloom of Niflheim, land of the dead...].
But that was the thing! Zhou Mi resisted the urge to sigh. Civilization seemed so far away--and it was. All he had for company was the sun, the leaves, and...
“Oi, Seasoning!”
.. and that, too. Zhou Mi gave in and let out a long, mournful sigh as he turned to face the only visitor he had ever had--Ratatoskr, the “squirrel” who travels through all nine worlds by means of the World Tree. He preferred the name Heechul. “That’s Vedrfolnir to you,” he berated. Heechul only rolled his eyes. “Come on, your real name is so shitty no one can pronounce it.”
Like Zhou Mi, Heechul wasn’t really a squirrel. He was, however, bestowed a pair of unfortunate fuzzy brown ears and a giant fluffy tail which only served to amplify the undefined amount of bitchiness stored in his humanoid body. Zhou Mi was pretty sure no “animal” on this tree was actually an animal. Hell, Odin’s horse Sleipnir was probably some beefy dude; Zhou Mi heard it referred to itself as Siwon.
“So anyways, my socially inept friend,” Heechul said cheerfully, beginning his weekly news report and thus snapping Zhou Mi out of his musings, “word is around Jotunheim that there’s a big fucking dragon eating out Ol’ Girl Yggdrasil’s roots down below. What do you think?”
“Um,” Zhou Mi began weakly, “is Jotunheim the place that’s on fire?”
“No, idiot,” Heechul snapped, “it’s the place with the giants. Jesus, you need to get out more.”
Zhou Mi blinked. “Who’s Jesus?”
“Nevermind,” Heechul dismissed impatiently, “so what do you think? About the dragon?”
Someone at the very bottom, Zhou Mi thought. He tried to imagine it--what the roots of Yggdrasil looked like--but he could only visualize the one sight he’s ever seen: thick bushels of healthy leaves, sun-dappled and gleaming with dew, the nine worlds blurry with fog below.
“I want to know what it’s like,” he decided firmly. Heechul gaped. “Um, hello? Proper response: ‘Why the fuck is it chewing up our Life Tree?’ ‘Why the hell is it down there in the first place?’ Notice how your question is not listed. Odin, Mimi, the sun must be getting to you. I knew overexposure wasn’t good--agh, my skin...”
Zhou Mi ignored him. The beginnings of an idea were forming in his mind.
“Say, Heechul,” he interrupted conversationally, “You travel all nine worlds, right?”
The “squirrel” snorted incredulously. “No shit, Sherlock.”
“Sherlock?” Zhou Mi repeated blankly. Heechul waved him off. “Well, anyways, and those nine worlds go down to the roots, right?”
“Uh, duh, ever heard of Hel--wait a second,” Heechul stopped, staring at Zhou Mi suspiciously, “you can’t mean--”
“Please, Heechul?” Zhou Mi begged, pouting, “can you please send a message down to that dragon?”
“Fuck no, what the hell Zhou Mi?” Heechul raged, “he’s probably going to eat me or something--”
“But Chullie!” Zhou Mi whined, resorting to pet names, “I want to know what it’s like down there! Please, Chullie, you’re so cool, if anyone can do it, it’s you. Milky white skin Kim Heechul! I love you Kim Heechul!”
At that Heechul paused and considered. Zhou Mi cheered mentally--flattery gets you everywhere. At least where Heechul was concerned.
“Alright, Seasoning,” he conceded, ignoring the sunny grin splitting Zhou Mi’s face, “I can go visit Hangeng, too, while I’m at it.”
--
Contrary to popular belief, the roots of Yggdrasil were not actually that tasty. It’s unfortunate it’s pretty much the only thing Kyuhyun can eat down here.
Yeah, life is pretty drab, he thinks, chewing on yet another root that tastes suspiciously like ash. Kyuhyun is situated in another one of his food tunnels branching out from his den [that he ate out himself, ugh, it’s good he has an incinerator for a stomach so he doesn’t need to carve out a toilet as well], doing the only thing he can really do down here. Eat. Not that he really likes to, which is why Kyuhyun mostly finds himself either singing or drawing all over the walls, which is why he is also ridiculously thin for a dragon who’s supposed to eat all day.
“What the hell am I doing here anyways?” Kyuhyun groans, his head falling back against the dirt walls of his ‘home’. He wasn’t so stupid as to think he could polish off all of the Yggdrasil roots--the tree needed to die, first, and being the Tree of Life, Kyuhyun highly doubted such a prospect would occur. “I should just kill myself,” he grumbles out loud just for the sake of hearing a voice, reverberating through the tunnels.
“Yeah, I would too if I lived in this dump.” A voice, different from his, echoes back to him and Kyuhyun jerks up so fast he smacks his head on the other side of the tunnel. “Ow, fuck,” he curses, stumbling through the tunnel back to his home den, his heart hammering wildly. Odin, he hasn’t had a visitor in so long--in forever--and how the hell did they get in here when he couldn’t even find a way out?
Finally, he emerges from the tunnel into the spacious cavern that was his home, his pitiful bed of moss revealed by the dim light of the glowing fungi--the only source of light. A girl is standing in the center of Kyuhyun’s room, with long orange hair and--”What the hell is sprouting out of your ass?” Kyuhyun questions dubiously. The girl whips around and glares and he realizes, oh, that’s a dude.
“It’s called a squirrel tail, dumbass. Christ, you’re worse than Seasoning,” he bemoans, and then stares at Kyuhyun with such intensity he starts shift uncomfortably. Kyuhyun lives pretty close to Hel, and the dead are loud so he’s heard them speaking of him--a fearsome dragon always gnawing at the Yggdrasil’s roots, though Kyuhyun’s pretty sure he doesn’t look like one.
Heechul sees a thin stick of a boy, pale but radiant, with soft chocolate brown locks curling at the nape of his neck, dark eyes and pink lips and thinks damn, maybe I should try that Yggdrasil diet, too. But what catches the most attention are the scaly, leathery dragon wings Kyuhyun sports, its iridescent scales gleaming in the dim light as they fold into the boy’s back. Heechul’s somewhat disappointed, somewhat not, but he’s got a message to deliver and a bitchiness quota to fulfill.
“So, dragon boy,” he begins, daintily setting himself down on the only thing above ground--the moss bed--as he begins his introduction. Heechul figures Kyuhyun lives under a rock as heavy as Zhou Mi’s when he first met him--in other words, as much knowledge as a newborn child. He begins with the basics. “I’m Ratatoskr, the squirrel that runs up and down the Yggdrasil. Yeah, that’s right bitch,” he adds, viewing Kyuhyun’s awed expression smugly, “I’ve been places. Anyways, you can call me Heechul.”
“Right. So, uh, Heechul," Kyuhyun begins, “how did you get in here?”
Heechul feels sort of bad as he sees the hope shining in those eyes. “As much as I’d like to bust you out of this shit hole, I came in through Hel.”
“Hel?” Kyuhyun repeats disbelievingly. Heechul nods smugly, because nobody enters Hel and comes out alive--except for him, of course. “Connections, man. Connections.”
Kyuhyun is crestfallen. I should have expected it, he thinks bitterly, before continuing. “And, so, uh, why are you here?”
Heechul huffs, “So, uh, how about a name first?” Kyuhyun bites back a rude comment; this man is terribly bitchy, or maybe all people outside of his little den are like that? Odin, he thinks, I hope not. For the good of the world.
“Nidhogg, but I prefer Kyuhyun,” he mutters, and ignores Heechul cooing ‘now that wasn’t so hard, was it?’, choosing instead to repeat his question. Because if Heechul didn’t have a good reason, Kyuhyun could do with a change in food. Heechul pouts--kids these days, always skipping the pleasantries--but delivers his message like a proper message squirrel should: as accurately as possible. Kyuhyun is extremely disturbed when Heechul’s voice suddenly turns excited and accented.
“Hi! This is Vedrfolnir. Um, if you didn’t know, I’m the hawk at the very top of the Yggdrasil? It’s nice to meet you! Kind of? I don’t think speaking through Heechul counts--oh! But anyways, you can call me Zhou Mi.”
Kyuhyun was suitably impressed by Heechul’s imitation skills: he could hear the big stupid smile.
“So, so, um, living up here is pretty nice! I mean, I wake up every day to sunshine, and, you know the deal with the tops of trees--lots of leaves! Um, how’s life down there? I can’t really imagine it. Uhh.. no sky, huh. Wait, really?! NO sky? Seriously?”
He could feel the beginnings of a frown tugging on his lips. Now it just sounded like this Zhou Mi guy was mocking him. What was a ‘sky’ anyways?
“B-but anyways! Yeah, I just want to know, uh.. how you’re living. Hahaha, must be pretty different, huh? Um, please reply through Heechul! Thanks!”
Kyuhyun is ready to reply as soon as Heechul closes his mouth.
“Well, hey, Vedr--howthehelldoyoupronouncethat--Zhou Mi, nice to hear from you--not. I’m Nidhogg, call me Kyuhyun. Don’t worry about meeting me, I don’t think I could take it. So the top of the Yggdrasil feels good, huh? Well, if you wanted to make yourself feel better, congratulations. My life sucks shit. No, there is no sky, I live in a giant dirt hole. Eating roots that taste like my foot. All day long. Pretty different, I’d agree. Bye. Don’t send Heechul down here again, he’s annoying.”
“Hey!” Heechul protested, though he was grinning. “You know, you’re kinda bitchy yourself.” Kyuhyun rolled his eyes. “Only to assholes who think they rule the world. Now get out of here, or I’ll kill the messenger, too.”
Heechul would have told Kyuhyun that his perception of Zhou Mi was entirely wrong, but as he stepped back into Hel and the arms of a worried Chinese man’s spirit, he figured he could withhold valuable information like that. He was Heechul, after all.
--
Zhou Mi’s facial expression goes a little like this:
Before the message: super excited, grin of colossal size that possibly took up three-quarters of his face.
After the message: utterly crushed, kicked puppy eyes and the saddest frown Heechul has ever seen in all nine worlds.
He dies laughing.
“I--No! I didn’t--I mean--It wasn’t--” Zhou Mi splutters, face ashen. “I’m not a jerk!” Zhou Mi cries at last, his body slumping in defeat. “And my name isn’t hard to pronounce,” he adds glumly. Heechul snickers.
Zhou Mi can only be described as down in the dumps, his great wings [and nose] drooping, lips quivering and how such a handsome man could look that pitiful is beyond him. But Heechul does have some good in his heart. You know, when he feels like it.
“I could clear some things up for you, if you want,” he suggests casually, and almost regrets it when Zhou Mi’s face lights up like the sun on steroids. God of Light’s got nothing on this kid.
“Really, Heechul? Oh, thank you, thank you!” Zhou Mi gushes, eyes sparkling with the chance to redeem himself, the kind of hopeful and happy that makes Heechul want to kick dogs. He wants to tell Zhou Mi that he’s not doing it for him, it’s to see Hangeng again, but neither of them would believe it and Zhou Mi is already blabbering his message.
--
“You know, I’m pretty hungry right now,” Kyuhyun tells Heechul the next time he arrives in his den. He’s not really lying--eating anything but roots sounds absolutely fantastic, but he’s pretty sure Heechul would taste bad. Too prissy. “I thought I told that guy not to send you down again?”
Heechul huffed. “Such a cold welcoming--especially since Zhou Mi and I brought you.. this!” With much extravagance Heechul pulls out from behind his back--
“What’s that?” Kyuhyun asks, frowning. Heechul smacked him. “It’s food, idiot! Real food!”
“Real food?” the dragon breathed, eyes wide. Something not roots? He moved forward, hands reaching out because now that he thought about it this ‘real food’ smelled amazing--
Heechul jumped back, smirking. Kyuhyun felt like crying as his hands met empty air. “Not so fast,” the ‘squirrel’ crowed imperiously, holding smoked meat and Yggdrasil berries above his head like a prize, “Zhou Mi requested you receive these items. So hey, I’ll give you these if you sit and listen to his message.”
Kyuhyun’s eyes narrowed. On one side, the last message Zhou Mi sent was complete assholery. But on the other side, there was food. And Zhou Mi couldn’t be that much of a bad guy if he sent food, right?
Whatever. “Ugh, fine, I’ll listen,” Kyuhyun grumbled, “just gimme the food.”
Ah, yes, bribery, Heechul thought, tossing the grumpy dragon the food, it always works. He cleared his throat.
“Hey Ky--Kyuh--Kui Xian?”
Kyuhyun choked on a morsel of heaven. “What the fuck?” he cried, “How can you get my name wrong?”
“Your name is hard to pronounce, too! But anyways, I’m really sorry! I didn’t mean for my message to come out that way! I’m not a jerk, I promise! Please forgive me!”
It was very surreal, hearing blubbery, whiny sounds coming out of Heechul’s mouth. The squirrel looked pretty disturbed himself.
“Life up here isn’t actually that nice either--I’m sorry I made you think I was belittling you, I just wanted you to think I lived in a cool place! But the truth is, I’m the only one up here. It gets really lonely sometimes, since Heechul is my only visitor. Sorry you have to eat roots that taste like your foot; I sent some berries down to you! I hope they taste better. It’s also really nice to talk to someone else for a change.. so please don’t stop talking to me? Please?”
“End of message.” Heechul proclaimed. “Man, am I a fucking telephone or something? Not that anybody else knows what that is..” Kyuhyun had slowed his ravenous eating, choosing to chew thoughtfully as he considered Zhou Mi’s slightly pitiful message. He swallowed and stared regretfully down at his hands, where there was no more Real Food. “Well,” Kyuhyun started, licking his fingers, “tell him this...”
--
“.. it’s Kyuhyun, not Kui Xian or whatever. Get it right! You’re so lucky you get to eat the berries instead of the roots. And you only have Heechul for company? Tough luck.
... But I don’t have anyone down here with me either, so I guess we’re in the same boat. I can hear the dead sometimes, if they’re really loud, but it doesn’t really count. It gets really boring, so sometimes I.. sing, or write--why am I telling you this?!
Anyways, you’re kind of pathetic.
.. If you keep sending food maybe I’ll put up with you.”
Zhou Mi was positively ecstatic. Heechul watched, somewhat nonplussed as the taller man squealed like a little girl, wings flapping and arms flailing.
“Oh, Chullie, isn’t this great?” Zhou Mi gushed, already reaching for a cluster of Yggdrasil berries, “He’ll talk to me! He told me he sings! Heechul, I sing, too!”
“Yeah, and so does everyone else,” the squirrel sighed, making himself comfortable on a branch as Zhou Mi fluttered about. “I can’t carry that many berries, and I don’t think dragon boy can eat all of those.”
Zhou Mi pouted. “But he’s so.. deprived! Kui Xian said himself the roots taste like feet. But I wonder what it’s like, being so close to the dead--oh, Heechul, can you tell him..”
Heechul groaned. “How did such a finely cultured being as myself become the middleman?”
--
Over a period of a Very Long Time, Zhou Mi the hawk and Kyuhyun the dragon grew closer. Not by distance--no, they were still at the very ends of the Yggdrasil--but through means of a disgruntled squirrel.
Zhou Mi was dumbfounded. He had never heard anything like where Kyuhyun lived: Winding tunnels and bare caverns, dimly lit by glowing fungi that let sound bounce off the walls endlessly. He heard about the mysterious Hangeng [“Yeah, Heechul comes in through Hel with the help of some Chinese guy.. what’s his name, Hankyung or something?”] and the gossip of the dead [“Baldur’s dead? Who was stupid enough to do that?!” "Apparently he was killed by a twig." "..What?"]. He heard about Kyuhyun’s wings, scaly and featherless and how he couldn’t really fully open them without brushing the walls--his confines. It left an ache in his heart, the wistfulness in his words Heechul artfully conveyed.
Kyuhyun was enraptured. Zhou Mi told him tales of a sky, something huge, the brightest blue and wide open. A place where he could soar or glide or do something other than eating. He told him about leaves and birds and a fiery golden disk in the sky, of warmth and wind and freedom. Zhou Mi also told him about sleet and lightning and rain, of the dangerous lack of shelter above but Kyuhyun thinks anything can be better than these unchanging caves.
Heechul brings news and gossip to both of them. He tells them about Tyr’s magic sword [“That idiot--sacrificing his sword for some pretty face?” “But Kui Xian, it’s so romantic!”] and the witch that twisted Loki’s mind, the resulting evil. How Loki’s children were horrid [“I heard Odin took one look at the daughter and chucked her down to Hel! Must’ve been seriously ugly.”] and the general not-good occurring.
Not that it effects the three of them, living in no world but on the World Tree herself, until one day Heechul rams into a very surprised Zhou Mi, who was attempting to make tea out of Yggdrasil leaves.
“What the hell are you doing?” Heechul asks. Zhou Mi looks down at his hands, where he is trying to wrangle ‘tea’ out of emerald leaves and into a dent in a branch. It wasn’t really working. Heechul interrupts him before he can say anything.
“Whatever. Seasoning, Ragnarok is coming! Ragnarok!” Heechul screeches. “I never thought I’d see it in my lifetime!”
“Heechul, we’re immortal,” Zhou Mi points out. “What’s Ragnarok anyways?”
He gapes. “Seaso--no, Zhou Mi, I’ve never told you about Ragnarok?” At the emphatic no, Heechul groans. “It’s the end of the world, you retard! You know, prophesied? Everybody dies? Two humans hide out in our dear Big Tree and start the world anew by going at it like bunnies?”
“What are bunnies?” Zhou Mi asked. Heechul smacked him.
“Never mind that--what do you think? Worlds collapsing and shit. Say goodbye to half of the gods and goddesses.”
Zhou Mi frowned. “I haven’t even met half of the gods and goddesses. And besides,” he added thoughtfully, “does it even change anything for me? The Yggdrasil still stands, right?”
“Fine,” Heechul grumbled, “don’t freak out with the rest of the nine worlds. It’s Doomsday, nothing to worry about. Hmph.”
--
Kyuhyun has much of the same reaction as Zhou Mi, leaving Heechul to pull his hair out in frustration.
“Hermits,” Heechul hisses. Kyuhyun rolls his eyes, scratching aimlessly at a wall. His eyes trail upwards, to the ceiling of his den. Roots twine around each other, emerging from thick earthy ground that Kyuhyun knows he can’t dig out of.
“Heechul,” he says suddenly, “do you think I’ll ever get out of here?”
The older stops bitching to look over at Kyuhyun thoughtfully. “Maybe,” he says, “you’re got eternity to try.”
--
Escape comes faster than he expects. Kind of.
Kyuhyun wakes up to the huge racket next door in Hel. The dead must be having a rave party or something because Kyuhyun can feel his den shaking as they stomp around, their groaning symphony echoing around his den. He’s half-awake and extremely grumpy [it’s hard enough falling asleep on a flat moss bed, and when you finally do? Do not disturb.], so it’s only natural for him to bang on the wall yelling at them to “Shut the Hel up!”
What’s not quite so natural is how the dirt walls start breaking apart, large chunks crumbling down to the floor. It takes a few seconds for Kyuhyun to realize, what the fuck his home is collapsing.
“Fuck!” Kyuhyun shouts, rocketing out of his pitiful bed. All around him rocks are tumbling; tiny landslides of dirt pile at his feet and Kyuhyun hopes he can die by suffocation. Being immortal sucks.
But then God comes in the form of a bushy-tailed pretty boy, and Heechul phases through a crumbling wall. “Kyuhyun,” he says, “I see your home is crumbling.”
“Yes, I see that too,” Kyuhyun hisses, “so get me out of here. Somehow. Like, now.”
Then the Chinese spirit--Hangeng--pops out of the wall, too, and hurriedly gestures for them to go through the rift Kyuhyun has never noticed. Hangeng looks exceptionally worried today, his apparition blurry and frayed.
“In case you didn’t know,” Heechul informs, “Ragnarok’s started and all the dead are marching to war. They’re going to get there by Naglfar--that's the name of the ship made out of the fingers and toenails of the undead. That’s why they’re having some problems.”
“This also means Mistress Hel is too busy to keep track of the no-alive-people rule,” Hangeng adds, “so you’re free to go.”
“Thank God,” Kyuhyun mutters, already halfway through the rift, “get me out of this shit hole.”
Cold air meets Kyuhyun’s first emergence from his home since forever, and he takes in the ranks of undead plodding along to get into a nasty looking ship Kyuhyun can smell from his distance. It’s dank and drab and generally unpleasant, but Kyuhyun figures that’s Hel for you. Heechul takes his elbow and drags him briskly through a series of tunnels and alleys, ins and outs, ups and downs until Kyuhyun emerges into a vast plain, half ice and half fire.
“Welcome to Muspellheim and Nifleheim,” Heechul introduced cheerfully, “now let’s get out of here.”
And then Kyuhyun found himself scurrying up roots he knew very well--Yggdrasil roots, twining and lively as he followed Heechul higher and higher. They passed a place of filled with the hugest beings he’d ever seen [giants, he guessed], a smoking world of smithing gnomes, the roots growing thicker and thicker until--
Kyuhyun emerged into the world of Midgard and saw the sky for the first time. It stretched for forever and on, wide open just like Zhou Mi promised. Enough to hold all of those birds and bugs Zhou Mi had talked about, all that and more.
Heechul punched him in the shoulder. “Stop gaping, you look stupid.” Kyuhyun quickly closed his mouth, but the awed look stayed. Heechul rolled his eyes.
“We’re all meeting at the top of the Yggdrasil. Don’t be late.” And with a flick of a very fluffy tail, Heechul was gone. Scaling up and away on the mighty trunk of the Yggdrasil.
Kyuhyun wouldn’t go that way. Slowly, his wings unfurled, creaking from underuse. He admired how they gleamed in the golden disc’s light--the sunlight--all deep, vivid colors. My wings are so much cooler than Zhou Mi’s. He thought smugly. Feathers are overrated.
Hesitantly, he flapped the leathery appendages, eyes widening as they lifted him of the ground, just for a second before gravity took hold and he touched ground again.
Wind, Zhou Mi had said, and a running start helps, too. Wind is something Kyuhyun has only had explained to him, not experienced, but as strange coldness flows around his skin, threading through his hair and gently pressing him backwards, Kyuhyun thinks he just did. Positioning himself to face the direction of the flow as Zhou Mi had instructed once, Kyuhyun began running. Slowly, naturally, his wings stretched outwards and then Kyuhyun was going up, rising and watching the earth that had trapped him for centuries become smaller, insignificant, and he’s escaped--
Then his wings tilted too much and Kyuhyun was spinning in air, plummeting downwards until he remembered to right himself. Kyuhyun repressed a sigh of relief as the ground grew smaller again. Flying did require some concentration--but it was weightless and free and everything Kyuhyun has been looking for.
He remembers Heechul and spirals up the Yggdrasil, enjoying the feeling of air on his outstretched wings as he goes higher and higher. He spies the rainbow bridge--Bifrost--that Zhou Mi was talking about. There’s a mass of bright fiery giants at the bottom of it, trying their hardest to break the only bridge from Asgard to Midgard and Kyuhyun figures Ragnarok is well on its way. He flaps his wings a little faster.
Kyuhyun finally sees the telltale leaves of the top of Yggdrasil, the way the sturdy trunk finally splits into a million different branches bursting into a billion different bushes of leaves and delicate golden berries, the first Real Food Kyuhyun’s ever had, courtesy of Zhou Mi [after tasting beef and cabbage and apples, he still thinks the berries are the best]. The leaves, bright and verdant, are dense and beautiful, and Kyuhyun is so caught up in admiring a landscape so new and different from his own that he almost doesn’t see Zhou Mi.
It’s a tall and strange silhouette out of the corner of his eye that he pays no mind to until it speaks, tentative and soft but undeniably Zhou Mi, “Kui Xian?”
Kyuhyun whips around so fast he almost falls--this flying business is hard!--and sees his ‘pen pal’, as Heechul calls it, for the first time. He tries to take it all in, the sharp features and sunny smile and majestic feathered wings, that this is Zhou Mi. The man flying toward him, bright eyed and long-legged is the one that told him of sun and stars, whispered to him of larks and bumblebees and life beyond a dim little den, of skies and warmth and open air.
“Zhou Mi?” Kyuhyun asks, though he doesn’t need to, because he already knows it’s him. Zhou Mi doesn’t even need to nod, and they just stay there, in the air staring at each other.
Zhou Mi has never once asked Kyuhyun what he’s looked like, not once in their whole length of communication. He sees a pale, slender boy, not as skinny as Heechul first saw him because he’s learned to enjoy food again but now healthier, with soulful dark eyes and thinks this is what Kui Xian looks like, the sharp-tongued clever boy he’s come to know. He has a picture to the person now.
It’s Kyuhyun who breaks the silence. “Your nose is big,” he notes. Zhou Mi chokes, and then starts laughing. “Thanks,” he chuckles, “you’re not so bad yourself.” Kyuhyun shrugs, and Zhou Mi motions for him to follow as he begins gliding towards the rendezvous point.
“So,” he starts, a little lamely, “how’s new life above ground?”
“You told me the sky was blue,” Kyuhyun accuses. Zhou Mi looks up just in time to see the screaming sun get eaten by a large wolf. The sky is an ugly shade between pitch black and nuclear waste green. “Sorry,” he apologizes, “I guess the end of the world does that to the pigments.”
“It’s fine,” Kyuhyun says, “at least I get to see you.”
When Zhou Mi looks at him tenderly, he looks away blushing and quickly “elaborates”, “I mean, now I know you look exactly how you speak. Like an idiot.”
With an indignant ‘hey!’ Zhou Mi pushes Kyuhyun, who starts laughing and soon it’s just like talking before--except this time they don’t need to wait a few days for a reply. It feels good.
“We’re hiding out in the base of all the Yggdrasil’s branches,” Zhou Mi informs, directing Kyuhyun through a rather inconspicuous entrance into the depths of the Yggdrasil’s canopy. “That way we’ll be protected by a bunch of wood and leaves and get a nice place to hang out in as everyone dies.”
“Cool,” Kyuhyun says. After several twists and turns--the top of the World Tree is a maze of leaves and branches, layers and layers of them--the two emerge into a spacious area, where the wide trunk first began branching off. The Yggdrasil’s branches are sinuous and strong, curving around the clearing to form an impenetrable dome of foliage and wood. Kyuhyun is suitably impressed, or would have been if his attention wasn’t drawn to the two figures already in the clearing.
“Hey, who are you guys?” Needless to say, Zhou Mi is surprised that he and Kyuhyun aren’t the only ones here. Two humans are sitting in the very center of the room, playing something that looks eerily similar to what Heechul refers to as ‘pattycake’. They both whip around, eyes widening, before the spacey-looking one grins and waves enthusiastically.
“Hey! I’m Donghae!” He cheers, and his floppy-haired friend seems to relax and gives a dorky smile of his own. “I’m Sunwoong, but you can call me Daniel, but you can call me Tablo.” They exchange a mischievous look as devious smiles spread across both of their faces, and Kyuhyun has a pretty bad feeling about what’s going to happen next.
Then the Donghae kid performs multiple cartwheels and handsprings to the beat of Tablo’s beatboxing, ending with what would have been an incredibly dashing leap into Tablo’s arms had Tablo not fallen under his weight. Still they had grins beating Zhou Mi’s on the ridiculous scale, hands down, as they jump back up and lean towards each other, placing their right hands and left hands together in what Zhou Mi thinks Heechul would call a ‘FUSION-HAH!’ position as they shout, “And together we are Lif and Lifthrasir!”
Kyuhyun looks too shocked to say anything, so Zhou Mi thinks back to what Heechul was telling him about Ragnarok and asks, “Isn’t one of you supposed to be a girl?”
Donghae shrugs, “We never figured out which one of us was Lif. It doesn’t really matter anyways, does it?” Zhou Mi’s pretty sure it does, since the whole reason they’re supposed to be kept alive is because of the whole repopulation matter, but then he sees them doing a complicated secret handshake involving pelvic thrusts and octopus dances and decides repopulation can lie in the hands of another couple.
“How did you guys get here before me?!” Heechul shrieks, bursting into the clearing with a bewildered but relieved[I don’t have to fight the gods now!] Hangeng in tow. “I wanted to introduce you guys to Blofish,” Heechul scowled, crossing his arms and stamping his foot.
“Blow.. fish?” Kyuhyun repeats blankly, stepping behind Zhou Mi when Tablo and Donghae whip around lightning fast.
“That’s US!” Donghae crowed, Tablo grinning, before turning back to what they were previously doing: playing the modified version of rock, paper, scissors, AKA rapist, policeman, beauty. Zhou Mi grasped Kyuhyun’s hand. “It’s ok,” he reassured, “I’m sure they’re really calm, beautiful people on the inside.”
Kyuhyun scoffed, though his cheeks were pink. “They’re as calm as Heechul is straight,” he grumbled, eyeing Hangeng suspiciously. Zhou Mi laughed, turning it into an awkward sounding cough as Heechul sent a look their way.
“We’ll be alright,” he persisted, smiling a stupid sunny smile, “at least we’ve got each other. Every day now.” This time Kyuhyun doesn’t shoot a sharp comment. He simply grasps Zhou Mi’s hand tighter and smiles.
“Man, those kids are so sappy,” Heechul whines.
“I’m sorry,” Hangeng says awkwardly, “do you want a beer?”
--
A/N: so yeah do you know that one youtube video where heechul imitates everyone’s reactions whenever he gets mad? B)
Also does anyone know how to keep all the italics when you copypaste your story into LJ? ):