Cherem [Prologue]
Title: Cherem
Chapter: 0/?
Rating: PG
Genre: Fantasy, AU
Characters: Taemin (SHINee), Hyunjoong (SS501), the rest of SHINee, cameos from other SS501 members and many other K-pop groups like SNSD and SUJU
Pairing(s): TBA
Warning: Rating will go up in later chapters
Summary: When Lee Taemin gets deported down from his comfortable position in the weather division to a strange division known only to most as ‘the Store’, he gets tangled up in the stuff that should stay safely in his daydreams. Three difficult house-spirits, plenty of strange, needy customers, one clumsy but strangely mysterious store-keeper, and one particularly curious customer who seems to keep coming back only when Taemin is around.
It’s all fun, but wishes are desires are dangerous things. And soon, Taemin begins to wonder if he’s biting off more than he can chew…
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But all lost things are in the angels' keeping
- Helen Hunt Jackson
~*~
They weren’t exactly angels per se. Definitely not like those in the definition of the bible. They weren’t the messengers of God, nor were they spiritual beings who only manifested in corporate form once in a while. They were more like guardians - people who weren’t really people anymore. And they watched over the workings of the world in those spaces in between.
But the world called them angels, and so angels they were called.
Taemin supposed he could be considered one of them. He worked in the weather division, where he was somewhat of a clerk, somewhat of a mathematician and somewhat of a dreamer. He wasn’t very important, or very significant - not like those he heard of in the gossips every week; those so famous that humans had names for them. Names whispered in myths or legends, some in reverence and some in fear.
Taemin didn’t really care. He wasn’t one for all the excitement, preferring the quiet, solemn atmosphere of his workplace. It allowed him to think about other things - to philosophize about the worlds out there, to write poetry, music, lyrics, to dance while no one else was in the room. And just once in a while, to allow himself the fantasy that he was one of those famous names out there. To indulge himself in the excitement without being in it, to watch the storm behind the glass.
Although, he supposed he was letting his daydreams take up a little too much of his time in the office. He had been shirking on his work a little to have a bit more time to stare out the window - lazing a report here, rushing a few calculations there.
And so it probably was his own fault when he got called out one day to get reprimanded. By Tiffany Hwang, no less. Head of his department. Amewarashi. Rainmaker of the East-Asian region. Well-known for her shrill voice when her unbelievably short temper gave way and her Lolita tendencies.
“Lee Taemin! Can you tell me what this is?!”
Taemin blinked at the paper slammed onto the table by a delicately lace-gloved hand. Inching closer, with one wary eye on his fuming supervisor, Taemin cast the other at the paper covered with complicated mathematical equations, pencil-marked workings and doodles of cute sheep and kick-ass Gundams.
At length, Taemin shifted backwards again, looking up into the impatient eyes of his supervisor. He had known exactly what it was even before Tiffany had shoved it at him, but he was still deciding the best strategy as to answer her, so that he didn’t end up kicked out on the streets, jobless, dodging his personal affects as they were flung out of the door after him.
“It’s…” Taemin answered with all the care when one was dealing with a rabid dog. “…my calculations sheet.”
“Bravo. The genius has finally deduced that this is indeed his own calculations sheet for the tsunami in Osaka, covered with his own trademark messy workings and random doodles. Which, on a side-track, may I ask why you submit your work with all this junk on the official calculations? You’re giving Siwon a hard job punching in the numbers.”
Taemin shrunk himself small under Tiffany’s smothering glare. Rather than looking straight into her eyes and possibly risk being burned alive, he decided to direct his eyes to the crop of soft curling feathers and pink rosettes perched precariously (it was almost a miraculous feat that they stayed pinned to her hair) atop Tiffany’s coiffed hair, and stayed smartly silent.
It seemed the right course of action, because Tiffany seemed to have only asked the question for the sake of rhetoric.
“But that doesn’t really matter. I don’t really care how you do your calculations as long as you get they are accurate and prompt.” Taemin’s eyes shifted downwards to the meaningful, heaving skirt-full of ruffles. He wasn’t looking, but he could feel the cold, disdain of poisonous look that Tiffany shot at him. “I’ve heard from Siwon that you’ve gotten the prompt part perfectly, but perhaps the accurate may have been a bit overlooked?!”
Then again, in the wake of the howls of wind that tended to accompany Tiffany’s rants when she was particularly vexed, he supposed it wasn’t that much of a difference.
He stayed completely still, almost stoning as Tiffany screamed on and on about how his calculations would have blown the tsunami off the coast of Sumatra entirely off scale and how so many innocents would have died and they certainly didn’t want a repeat of what happened the last huge tsunami there, where a small screw-up of an extra 10 people dying had brought about an pain-in-the-ass full-scale investigation and a hell lot more of paperwork and how if a 0.0000000001 discrepancy had brought about all that, then Taemin’s 0.000000001 mistake would have brought about even worse and -
“ARE YOU EVEN LISTENING TO ME?!” Taemin had to grab onto a welded down table (yes, the fixed assets department had learnt well after the first time an employee had angered Tiffany) in order to prevent himself from flying out of the window from the force of Tiffany’s shout.
Tiffany was really pissed, Taemin found out as two minutes later, the gale force swirling in the room had not died, and Taemin was in danger of losing his grip.
“Woah~ What’s going on here?”
Taemin yelped as the gale mysteriously died down, and his face was 3 seconds away from smashing into the floor when a strong hand caught the scruff of his collar. He turned and stared into the cheery face of one Lee Soonkyu, or Sunny, as she preferred to be called. Descendent of the Korean sun-goddess Haesoon. Head of the auditing department.
And also, Tiffany’s mortal enemy.
Taemin winced a little, quickly looking away from Sunny’s face due to her natural radiance she had inherited from her ancestor, and regretting it almost immediately.
Tiffany looked like someone had stuck an unripe lemon up her ruffle-covered arse. And that look only worsened as Sunny gently lowered Taemin to the ground, amused smile radiating even in her voice.
“Ah… my dear, dear Tiffany. Temper, temper! Don’t want to blow away some important papers again and mess up the budget!” Sunny trilled cheerfully while Taemin tried his best to shrink away from any attention of any kind. He wondered how it was really possible that someone could be so obtuse as to not be affected by the death glare Tiffany was giving her. “But I digress - I meant to ask what was so riling our dear sweet Tiffany so?”
Taemin hoped that Tiffany would go on some rant of some kind at Sunny, as she had been known to commonly do, and conveniently forget about him. But luck was not on his side, and possibly because his transgression this time was admittedly quite serious, Tiffany didn’t, instead directing the death glare at him.
“That boy.” Taemin wondered how she could make two innocent words seem like a righteous insult. “He messed up again. I’ve had so many reports of him skiving and lazing at work, and I’ve nagged him time and again, but he only seems to be getting worse.”
Taemin wished the ground would open up and swallow him. It seemed as if Tiffany was going to really chew him out this time, and in front of another rather prominent figure in their division. But Sunny seemed to decide that she was in a benevolent mood today. And Taemin mentally reminded himself again to buy some of Sunny’s favourite chocolates as he’d been meaning to - it wasn’t the first time Sunny would have gotten him out of Tiffany trouble.
“Now, now. He is pretty young. Don’t need to be so hard on him.” Sunny soothed, although Taemin wasn’t very sure Tiffany wanted Sunny’s soothing. “You know, there are other ways of punishing him other than yelling at him. More effective ways.”
Both Tiffany and Taemin paused in their actions and turned to Sunny in dumb disbelief. Taemin had no choice but to turn away after a few seconds, Sunny’s face radiating light in her enthusiasm, but he could see Tiffany stare at Sunny, before slowly, her soured expression uplifting into a smile Taemin would rather not see.
“Really?” Taemin shivered in horror at the sudden cheerful wind that blew past. “And what sort of ‘more effective ways’ are there?”
“Well.” Sunny paused deliberately. “I heard that there’s another division sorely behind their work schedule since their supervisor is away, and Yunho was looking around for volunteers to clean the mess up.”
“Another division?” Tiffany looked confused for a moment, but an astounding exchange of information that must have taken place telepathically (for Taemin definitely didn’t understand the raised eyebrows and understanding looks) solved that. “Oh… you mean that division.”
They both turned on Taemin, looking at him with thoughtful faces, and suddenly, Taemin wasn’t so sure he wanted to buy Sunny those chocolates anymore.
~*~
It was called the Store.
Taemin wasn’t exactly sure what to make of it. His first impression of it was a squat, traditional Japanese house - that was until he looked up and was stunned to see a towering jumble of every other style of building that one could possibly conceive. It was a rather powerful person in charge of this division, Taemin thought as he entered and then promptly tripped over one of the million things strewn on the floor - a powerful and extremely messy person, Taemin rectified.
He’d picked his way through the mess (although it was a rather fascinating mess of a mix of junk and valuable antiques) to what had seemed like a relatively cleaner information desk. He looked around for someone to report to, but there was no one around. He could only guess that without their supervisor around, the other employees slacked till no end, and were probably out having fun in that other world.
Figuring that he’d might as well sit down at the only unoccupied chair in the whole room (there were a whole ‘It’s a Small World’ series of chairs actually), he’d just planted his butt onto the dull grey cushion when the door he’d just entered from burst open again.
And that was how Taemin’s second opinion of the place was quickly formed.
It was a lost and found place, it seemed, where all the lost things ended up in. That was quite easy to deduce - and it was the reason for all the mess, because things, when you aren’t looking, are just that easy to lose.
Like the first customer who came in would relate, face tear-streaked and desperate, looking for his dreams.
“Please. Can you help me find them?” the knit-covered man had pleaded, wringing his green woolen fingers together as he asked. “I’m sure someone would have picked them up by now.”
Taemin looked at the sad brown eyes and red-tipped nose hidden between woolen cap and thread-bare scarf, and just couldn’t find the heart to tell him he had just arrived and had no idea how the place operated. Instead he sat down, activated the sleeping computer and hoped he wasn’t going to be in trouble for missing out a few regulations or two.
It took him a while, but he thought he had figured out what to do. Looking through the database with the choice search words of ‘dreams’, ‘lost’ and ‘Lee Jinki’, he pulled up any result on the matter.
It wasn’t the first time this Jinki’s been here. All Taemin found were records and more records of requests to return one Lee Jinki’s dreams and nothing else.
He looked up into those eyes and wondered what were in those dreams to make him so desperate, to come again and again, knowing that he’d be disappointed. “I’m sorry, no one’s found your dreams yet.”
If it wasn’t obvious earlier then it’s obvious now that Jinki’s no first-time customer. “Then, can I at least fill in the request form again?”
Taemin restrained a sigh, before he nodded. “Alright, sir… Give me a minute.”
It took more than a minute, ten actually, with plenty of help from an anxious Jinki, but Taemin finally posted the request up on the computer for whoever was out there to read.
Name: Lee Jinki
Age: 20
Item lost: Dreams
Please kindly deposit them at the store if you found them.
~*~
Jinki came back two hours later. Or at least it’s two hours on the clock. To Taemin, it felt like a hundred years. He’d been bombarded with customers coming in and asking for their lost things to be found - keepsakes, memories and all things in between.
It’s a near miracle that Taemin hadn’t lost his patience yet, though he can practically feel it fraying at the seams. Some of the customers are nice and harmless, and those he can dismiss with his salesperson smile, and some others are like Jinki, wet-eyed and red-nosed, and those Taemin had at least some twinge of sympathy to make all the useless action seem less troublesome.
But then, some others were like the one he’s dealing with just as Jinki stepped in again. A Kim Kibum, whose only goal in life seemed to be to make Taemin as miserable as possible, within as least time as was possibly conceivable.
“I want to find my childhood!” Taemin winced as Kibum slammed his fist onto the wooden table for what felt like the hundredth time within one minute, and Taemin wondered why the table hadn’t caved in yet - he’s pretty sure that that dent in the oak wasn’t there before. “Come on! I don’t believe that no one’s reported it at all!”
Taemin heaved a sigh, wondering why he was bothering with patience. But it’s the way he was, and so he explained again. “I already ran the check four times. The search came out void - someone did report in your childhood, but it’s not here anymore. The archive records it as ‘misplaced’.” And Taemin wasn’t surprised, for childhoods were slippery things - things that weren’t so easily found once they were lost. And he was surprised that it was even found in the first place.
“I don’t care!” Taemin felt his veins burn with something like poison as he internally groaned at listening to that whining voice grating protests in his ears. “I want to find my childhood!”
Maybe it’s the fact that it’s somewhat of his own fault that he’s in this predicament in the first place that he’s actually held his patience so far. Like all weather spirits, he’s a little drifty and temperamental. He liked things to go at his pace - to be fast when he needed it to be fast, and to be slow when he liked it to be slow. His kind certainly wasn’t made to be tied down to listen to the complaints and pleas of others, annoying or not, or even if they had rivers flowing from their eyes, crying out for sympathy. And so, to put it bluntly, Taemin lost it.
It was slow at first - just a twitch of an eyebrow, and the beginning of the frown peeking through cracks of the salesperson smile. And then the acerbic words that slid forth from the depths of Taemin’s frustrated heart. “Truthfully, I don’t think you ever lost your childhood with the way you’re acting. Maybe you should check for it again.”
It’s all said with a voice as light and sweet as whipped cream, yet it was cream that’s beyond its expiry. And it stunned both Kibum, who had probably formed the opinion of Taemin as being a whipped employee, and Jinki, who was wondering what had happened to the helpful young boy who let him fill in the request form again.
Taemin got up with a smile that’s all on his face and not in his eyes. He leaned over and patted Kibum sagely. “I’m sure you’ll find it at home or somewhere you didn’t care to look. Who knows, it may even be under your nose.”
Then he turned and smiled at Jinki, “And now, I’m sorry, sir, but you may not fill in the request form again. New company policy.” He shoved his hands into his pockets, ignoring that dumbfounded stares, and stalked off to take what he thought was a well-deserved bathroom break.
~*~
And it descended even more from there.
“I’m looking for the doll my father made. He died five years ago,” said the woman with the orange hair and cornfield blue eyes.
Taemin replied with a smile like winter frost behind a glass. “No, I doubt anyone would care to return it. It’s a new generation out there which discards the old for anything new. Maybe you’d like to try the toy department for something which looks similar, or maybe you’d try something new?”
“M-my confidence, I-I’ve l-lost it. P-please…?”
Taemin raised an eyebrow at the man twiddling his thumbs and found he had no patience even to type into the database. “I-I’m s-sorry? C-could you r-repeat t-that?”
“You’re really mean,” said the sour-looking woman who steps up from behind the man that stuttered and now walked away. “And your hair looks weird.”
“Really? And you, miss, what did you lose?” Taemin sighed, running a hand through the commented on hair, and could only think how it was all the fault of these people.
“My tact.” She replied and Taemin had to laugh.
“Well, good that you know.” He smirked as she huffed and walked off, nearly bumping into the next person, who loses his balance and Taemin laughed meanly while commenting on how that person would need to fill in two forms.
Most of the customers had begun to leave, thinking that it was just not worth getting back what they lost in return for such treatment. And for that Taemin was pleased. But then, there were those who were just so desperate, that they didn’t care how they were treated as long as what they had lost was once again found.
Like the boy, who against all looks of warning stepped forward with a wild look in his eyes. “Please! Help me! I need to find my lost love!”
And Taemin’s eyebrows furrowed and twitched in annoyance - he knew even before he’d key in the search that something like that would never be found. For lost loves were even worst down on the list than lost eyesight or lost names. It was just one of those things only the insanely lucky would find back again. “Sir-”
“I know, I know, it’d be hard! But I’ve tried everything else! Please, please! Just this once. Help me! My name’s Kim Jonghyun, just help me time in the request! Please! I jus-”
“That’s impossible.” Taemin stood up, chair scraping against the tilled floor like a punctuation to his annoyed look. “You should just give up on that love.”
“But-!”
“But nothing.” Taemin’s lips curved. “If you’re that desperate? How about I give you my love instead?!”
There was pregnant silence as Taemin suddenly leaned forward, lips bare inches away from a stunned Jonghyun’s. Pregnant grew longer and longer, until the silence was almost deafening, like knives to one’s ears. Then finally, Taemin slowly backed down, his smile like a smirk, and the quirk of his eyebrow like triumph.
Jonghyun left without saying anything more, as did everyone else. And Taemin was almost too pleased with himself as he sat back down and in a room devoid of anything but the things which were lost and no one would ever, ever claim again.
~*~
“Excuse me…”
Taemin looked up in surprise. He’d thought he had gotten rid over everybody. But unless the man standing there with the curly brown hair and twinkle in his eyes didn’t actually exist, Taemin evidently hadn’t.
But Taemin wasn’t that inflexible. He took it into stride, cupping his own cheek with a hand as he wondered what sort of acerbic comment he could make now. He did wonder though, for the man in front of him did not look like one who had lost something. “What is it that you’ve lost, sir?”
“Oh, no, it’s not me.” The man replied to Taemin’s confused frown. “It’s you. You seem to have lost your smile.”
Taemin stared at the man, stunned, as the other continued. “But don’t worry, I’m sure you’ll find it. For a smile, although precious, is thankfully easy to find again. Someone is bound to pick it up. Choi Minho, by the way, pleasure of meeting you is all mine.”
There was a silence now, one that is like a cat not realizing it had done wrong and had now found out it had. Then the words tumble out of Taemin’s mouth like a rush. “Have you found it then? My smile, I mean.”
The man didn’t answer, only winked at Taemin once, before he waved his hand in some sort of gesture which could be counted as cool, before he walked off, leaving Taemin behind.
He didn’t know how long he stood there, staring at empty space which had once been filled. He only knew when he heard a small squeak, and he turned to see Jinki duck his head behind the door he was hiding. “I-is there… r-really no way to f-fill in the r-request form again?”
Taemin stared for a while at the quivering bundle of wool before he quirked his head, moving behind the computer again. “Well, it may be against the rules to fill in the request form, but it isn’t against the rules to check the database again.”
Jinki blinked, before he shuffled closer as Taemin shook his head with a sympathetic look. “I’m sorry. No one has found your dreams yet.”
Jinki looked crestfallen, before he looked up in shock as Taemin said. “So I guess you’d like to fill in the request form again, huh?”
“B-but…” Jinki stared at Taemin as the boy began to pull up the file with the form on it again. “Isn’t it against the rules?”
Jinki was not expecting the smile on Taemin’s lips as he put a finger up to them in a mischievous vow to secrecy. And Jinki wondered why Taemin hadn’t smiled like that before.
~*~
Name: Lee Jinki
Age: 20
Lost item: Dreams
Any other information: Although it may be a bit out of your way, whoever who sees this might be kind enough to keep an extra look out for this item. Although it maybe only be one person’s dream and thus not of much consequence, it is very important to the owner. So, I ask of anyone out there who is kind enough to take the extra time to return it. Thank you.
Please kindly deposit them at the store if you found them.
~*~
[ Chapter 1 ]