A/N: Here's the new Chapter! Which also means the next FIVE chapters are up on my Patreon for early access!

Since I don't think it was clear last chapter, the moment when Jinu intervened was when Bobby was getting his soul halfway sucked out of his body and straight up in the middle of dying. Jinu stopped the soul sucking in the nick of time but as a result, Bobby did not in fact hear his assailants call Jinu a 'traitor'. I just wanted to clarify that~

-x-X-x-

They'd almost lost Bobby tonight.

"Okay, okay, let me see if I've got this straight. You three are the latest generation of demon hunters masquerading as musicians, all so that you can weave the love and adoration of the fans into a protective shield over the world while also fighting demons day in and day out to keep them from stealing our souls. Do I have that right at least?"

Rumi's heart had damn near fallen out of her chest when he'd first called. He'd sounded so scared… and out of breath too. Like he'd nearly died… which he had. And then he'd started talking about shapeshifting demons trying to replace him to get at them and Rumi's whole world had damn near fell apart.

"… Yeah Bobby, that's right."

"Great, thank you Mira. Okay and the ultimate goal is the Golden Honmoon, which you girls saw glimpses of on the finale of your World Tour. And that's why Rumi pushed up the release of Golden in the first place despite clearly needing to rest her throat. Because you three have been told all your lives that you're the generation of hunters who are going to seal the Honmoon and save the world for good. That sound about right?"

The demons had never tried to do anything like this before. Oh sure, they went after weak and vulnerable humans if the hunters didn't catch them in time, but this? This wasn't like that. This was premeditated. This was planned. Bobby had told them everything that had happened, how they were planning to imitate him to get close to Rumi and her girls.

"Yep, that's basically the long and short of it Bobby!"

"Cool, Zoey. Cool… cool, cool, cool…"

It wouldn't have worked of course. Rumi fully believes that any single one of them would have clocked a demon shapeshifted as Bobby immediately. There was no demon alive that could possibly imitate his warmth and love.. But even if they caught the imposter IMMEDIATELY, what would it have mattered? Bobby would have still been gone, his soul fed to Gwi-Ma before they even had a chance to save him. They wouldn't even have known he needed saving until it was far too late.

"Uh… how're you handling this Bobby? You feeling alright? What do you… think about all of this?"

Rumi was such a failure. A failure as a leader, a failure as a friend. This was all her fault. She'd almost got Bobby killed, she'd almost-

"What do I think, Mira? I think… I think I haven't been doing nearly enough for you girls!"

Wait what. Rumi jolts out of her own thoughts as Bobby's words register. Until now, the poor man had been pacing back and forth across the floor of their penthouse while she, Mira, and Zoey all sat on the couch and watched him wear a hole in the carpet. But now?

"What are you talking about Bobby?! You do more than enough for us!"

"Yeah, don't be ridiculous, you're the best manager we could ever hope for!"

Mira and Zoey look to her, but they needn't have worried that she was still stuck in her own head. Rumi is already nodding along, already speaking in a clear, concise, no-nonsense tone that she'd learned from Celine.

"They're right Bobby. You've done everything we ever asked of you without complaint."

But Bobby isn't in the mood to hear it. Grabbing his head with his hands, he groans.

"But I could be doing so much more! You're doing twice the work I thought you were and with only half the support you girls need! You need to- I need to-!"

Rumi shares a bemused but also fond glance with Zoey and Mira before slowly nodding as the three of them rise from the couch and begin to approach their panicking manager.

"Wait, what are you three doing-!"

A minute later and they have Bobby completely cocooned in half a dozen blankets and laid out on their couch. Once he's been properly burritofied, everything that had happened (and almost happened) finally catches up to him and he's out like a light and softly snoring within moments.

Heh, Bobby could be such a workaholic sometimes. It was on Rumi to make sure he didn't push himself so far, just like with her girls.

After they make sure he's nice and snug in his cocoon, the three of them retreat over to the kitchen, which thanks to the penthouse's open floor plan, allows them to keep Bobby in line of sight at all times. Zoey is the first to break the silence between them.

"We almost lost Bobby tonight."

Rumi internally flinches as the youngest member of the group tearfully repeats her own thoughts without knowing it. Mira just slumps, not even having a pithy response.

"Yeah… and I dunno what we're going to do about it either."

When Rumi and Zoey both look at her curiously, Mira grimaces and glances over at Bobby's sleeping form before crossing her arms over her chest.

"What could we have done differently tonight? What went wrong, exactly? Because from where I'm standing… technically nothing did. I don't even know where the demons who went for Bobby originally came from. Did either of you feel an extra tear in the Honmoon that we just didn't get to?"

No… no she hadn't. Zoey shakes her head, signaling that she didn't either. Mira grits her teeth before scowling.

"Exactly. So what… now we have to decide between protecting our band manager or closing Honmoon Tears? What if they make a play for Bobby again? What if they do this every night until they succeed? We can't be everywhere at once. But… if we don't defend the Honmoon, a lot more people than just Bobby are at risk."

Fuck. She's right. Rumi hates it, but Mira is completely correct. Gwi-Ma has now put them between a rock and a hard place. Do they leave defenseless and helpless Bobby to his own devices each night or do they ignore the Honmoon's distress as more and more demons tear their way into the human realm?

Of course, Rumi knows it's no choice at all. Or at least, Celine would advocate for the first option, one hundred percent. After all, the Honmoon and the greater whole of people it protected were all that mattered in the end. No single person could ever mean as much, not when Gwi-Ma got more and more powerful by the number of souls he consumed.

"But… I mean… we didn't even save Bobby tonight. The 'Jeoseung Saja' did."

Zoey's words make Rumi twitch and Mira frown. Looking between them for a moment, Zoey bites her lower lip.

"Guys… what if this guy really is a good demon? Or… or not a demon at all or something? What if he's really on our side."

No, it wasn't possible. But before Rumi can shut down the idea, Mira gives a simple half shrug, looking like she's considering it much to Rumi's horror.

"He DID save Bobby…"

Getting a bit more energetic, Zoey bobs her head up and down.

"Right?! And we weren't even here to see it so it wasn't like he was trying to impress us! He just… did it! And Bobby said that he even told him to 'take care of his girls'. That we 'need him more now than ever'. What does that even mean unless he's actually on our side?!"

It really didn't make any sense. Rumi's head felt fuzzy at this point. Why was a demon helping them? What did it mean that his patterns weren't purple when hers still were? And why had he saved Bobby like that?

"… It could still be a trap, maybe."

Mira doesn't sound certain, but Rumi nevertheless looks at the other girl… only to see her looking right back, frown on her face and concern in her eyes.

"But it does feel way too convoluted for a demon scheme. In all our time fighting these bastards, we've never had to deal with anything as complicated as… this. The attempt at impersonating Bobby, that feels legit. Like it's something Gwi-Ma might actually try since we're so close to sealing the Honmoon and he's getting more and more desperate. But this Rainbow Demon who can heal the Honmoon and is apparently looking out for not only us but also our manager… I honestly don't get how that translates to bad intentions. I can't wrap my head around it."

Zoey just nods, looking as lost as Mira sounds… and as lost as Rumi feels. But unlike her bandmates and best friends, Rumi isn't allowed to be lost. She isn't allowed to be confused. She's supposed to be the leader and she's gotten so caught up in her own head that she realizes now she's been doing a pretty damn bad job of that. Frankly, she's been doing a bad job ever since she released Golden early.

"It doesn't matter."

Her firm voice causes Mira and Zoey to straighten up and look at her, Zoey with wide eyes and Mira with narrowed slits. But Rumi just looks at them both with her signature encouraging smile. It was something she'd practiced in front of the mirror for literal years before she even met them and it never failed to get them on board.

"What matters is that we're a team. And Bobby… Bobby is still here. With us. We aren't going to let anything happen to him, just like we're not going to let anything happen to the Honmoon either."

She can see her words already having an effect. Rumi pushes down on all of her feelings and focuses on what matters… keeping Zoey and Mira safe and protecting the Honmoon. Reaching out, she grabs hold of her girls' hands, relishing in the way they immediately intertwine their fingers in hers and squeeze right back.

"We still need to capture our mystery demon. No matter what he's done on our behalf, he's still doing something weird to the Honmoon, and we've got to put a stop to that. And… we need to continue preparing for the Idol Awards. Playing Golden there live for the first time is our best bet of sealing the Honmoon once and for all."

Zoey nods excitedly, always happy to latch onto Rumi's confidence, false or otherwise. Mira though… well, she's a bit more difficult sometimes. Rumi doesn't love her any less for it though.

"Are you sure your voice will be okay by then, Rumi?"

No. Rumi isn't sure. She's not sure of anything regarding her voice, truth be told. The demon patterns have her by her throat now… literally. But all she can do is rest and hope and pray. And of course, not let on that anything is still wrong to the girls who are relying on her.

"Yep. It'll be great. I'll talk to Celine about it, get some of her wisdom to make sure everything goes to plan. It was… probably a bad idea to hide it from her in the first place. In the meantime, we need to track down that mystery demon and figure out what he's up to. The plan hasn't changed on that front; we're still going for the capture so we can question him properly."

This time Mira is the one to nod while Zoey hesitates, the younger woman cringing back a little bit.

"I… I'm kind of glad Celine told us we have to capture him. I don't know if… I don't think I could kill him after how he saved Bobby. Even if he IS a demon, he's the only reason Bobby is still with us…"

Zoey's eyes slide over to the couch where the Bobby Burrito is still snoozing away and Mira and Rumi can't help but follow her gaze. After a long moment, Rumi lets out a soft exhale, knowing her girls are focused on Bobby at the moment.

Celine had been right to tell her to keep her patterns concealed. Just two encounters with a demon who wasn't actively trying to kill them and Zoey and Mira were already starting to have doubts about whether all demons were bad or not.

They WERE all bad. There was no doubt about it as far as Rumi was concerned. After all… between the damage she'd done to the Honmoon, her inability to sing Golden, and now them almost losing Bobby… even Rumi didn't have any right to call herself 'good'.

-x-X-x-

He hadn't known their manager that well the first time around. In fact, Jinu's one and only face-to-face encounter with Bobby had been during the fan meet-up that the Saja Boys had crashed. The HUNTR/X Manager hadn't hesitated to step in between his girls and the mad rush of fans, even as Jinu and the rest of his band had stayed at the head of the pack by virtue of waiting in line in sleeping bags over night.

And indeed, when Jinu and the rest of the Saja Boys had revealed themselves in all of their spotlight stealing glory, Bobby hadn't hesitated then either. He'd immediately called for another table, showing that he had a good head on his shoulders. Better than Jinu was expecting, really.

After all, kicking the Saja Boys out so soon after their debut would have sparked serious social media outrage according to Romance. People would have called HUNTR/X petty and small for being so 'hard' on their juniors. They would have ripped Rumi and her girls to shreds for being so cold and unapproachable.

That was even what Jinu had been anticipating back then. But he definitely hadn't expected Bobby to see right through their ruse and easily parry it away with the skill only a long time manager could wield. Just as he hadn't expected Rumi to go even further and bring them all to sit at the same table. Nor had he anticipated that little girl giving him her drawing like she had.

Jinu, you have a beautiful soul

In hindsight, that was the beginning of the end for him. From then on, Rumi had gotten more and more under his skin even as he was manipulating her and plotting her downfall. And all because Bobby was smart enough not to cause an incident by kicking the Saja Boys out of the venue.

One small domino that had ultimately led to Jinu throwing himself in front of Gwi-Ma's blast to save Rumi's life and offer up his soul so she would have the power to defeat the Demon King once and for all.

Really though, Jinu is glad Bobby isn't dead. And now that the other man knows about demons, maybe he can help Rumi and the others a bit more. Maybe confessing this secret to Bobby will help Rumi realize that confessing certain bigger secrets to certain others before things get worse could also be a good idea…

Tilting his head to the side, Jinu considers everything he knows about Rumi for a long moment and whether that's actually a possibility or not.

… Yeah no. There's absolutely no way she's going to take this whole thing as a lesson in honesty and a sign to start trusting her friends. Letting out a sigh, Jinu runs a hand down his face. He's got his work cut out for him, doesn't he?

-x-X-x-

A/N: Jinu: "Okay but even still, maybe this can be the first crack in Rumi's hard, crunchy exterior."

Rumi: *CONCEAL DON'T FEEL INTENSIFIES*

-x-X-x-

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