Chapter Text
“So…” mumbles Joohyun as she moves across the living room, eyes still trained on her scribble-filled notebook, frowns etched on her forehead. She is normally an organised person but taking on-scene witness stamen is very challenging. If only they could slow down and not talk like a rapper for once, it would be great. Being a newbie field detective, she has yet to master the art of writing in abbreviations so her only choice is to write fast. Her notes end up being completely unreadable most of the time. “I need to revise this.” She decides and turns on her heels. “Let’s go down with the events again, from top to bottom.”
“Again? We’ve been over this like… three times?” Mr Jung, the victim of the breaking and entering case Joohyun is working on, exclaims loudly. “It’s almost like the two of you are not even trying to help me.”
“Excuse me.” Her frowns deepen, very offended. “How is this not trying to help you?” She wildly gestures at the empty space between Mr Jung and her with a finger. Mr Jung snorts then points an accusatory finger to the other side of the living room where another detective, a male, is having the time of his life relaxing on Mr Jung’s massage chair. Earphones plugged into his ears; the man is completely oblivious of his surroundings. Joohyun rolls her eyes so hard it almost gives her a migraine. She strides over and delivers the hardest slap she could manage on the man’s shoulder, causing him to jump out of the chair. Satisfied with the reaction, Joohyun settles on a couch next to her. “Detective Oh, we’re in the middle of a case. Focus!”
Sehun looks like he just lost 10 years from his life. “God, Bae Joohyun. Let me have a break. I didn’t get enough sleep last night. Besides, have you looked at this?” He exaggeratedly points at the massage chair with both hands, acting like the models from commercial videos. “This is a premium super expensive massage chair that I definitely can never afford in this lifetime. Let me pretend I’m wealthy for 5 minutes. I’m sure Mr Jung wouldn’t mind, right, old man?”
“Who’re you calling old man?” Mr Jung snaps back.
Joohyun facepalms and groans loudly. This is getting nowhere. “That’s not the point.”
There is a long awkward silence in the room, all three of them staring at each other. Sehun is still standing beside the massage chair, earphones hanging limply from his palm, his smartphone on the other. They remain stationary for the next minute before Sehun dumbly blinks and asks. “So, what is?”
During her first year in the Police Academy, Joohyun got teased a lot for her small size. Other trainees often questioned her competence to be a police officer. She was a late grower. She remained below the average height until her second year, where she also took advantage to eat more and build more muscles. Joohyun proved herself worthy by placing first in combat practices, even managed to bring down males twice her size. It had been a while since she got engaged in fierce fights and right now Sehun is being very, very testing.
“Does 10 thousand worth of loss ring a bell? How about breaking and entering? Or, I don’t know, your job?”
Ah, you mean my job as an awesome detective?” Very testing. Joohyun takes a deep breath before finally nodding. She is trying incredibly hard not to squash this man’s face into pulps. Next time their captain asks her to partner up with Sehun, she will burn their precinct. Really. “That, I already solved. I was just waiting for you to wrap up, then we can drag this old scumbag back to the precinct. And the chair was calling my name.”
“What?” Both Joohyun and Mr Jung scream in unison, “What are you… explain, please.”
“This man trashed his own apartment, broke his window and door handle, then he called on us for breaking and entering. That’s why we couldn’t find other fingerprints no matter how hard we look, because there isn’t one.”
“And how did you come out with that? Do you even have any proof?”
Joohyun watches as Sehun makes his way toward the broken window and crouches next to it. Not wasting her time, Joohyun jumps to her feet and skip to Sehun’s side. “I won’t blame you for overlooking this. You haven’t been out on the field for long. Look at this. There’re only larger chunks of broken glass on the floor, none of the smaller shards. I bet he smashed it from inside, then went outside to grab the larger pieces to put them here, totally overlook the small pieces. That was the first clue. After that, I went around the room and connected the dots somehow.”
As the man explains, Joohyun chances a look at Mr Jung. He could see the middle-aged man visibly shaken and affected. That is how she know Sehun is on the right track. “T-that’s hardly a proof!” The man manages, not very assuring. If anything, it just made him looks more suspicious.
Joohyun watches as Sehun takes a huge leap to stand face to face with Mr Jung. There is a coy smirk hanging on the detective’s lips. Maybe it is his 6 feet tall figure, or maybe it is his overflowing confidence, but Mr Jung shakes even more. He begins to sweat too, a lot.
“Maybe you think I am an idiot…”
“You are an idiot.”
“Thank you, Detective Bae.” Sehun huffs like a child, Joohyun has to swallow her snorts. It is a serious moment. “I am actually one of the best detectives in the precinct. Heck. I am actually the best. You criminals all go with the same old tricks in the end.” He lifts a hand and points toward the television set facing seating area. “Go look there closely, Joohyun. There’s a hidden camera, built in onto the telly, like a laptop’s webcam.” As prompted, Joohyun goes to inspect and Sehun is right, there is indeed a camera on the frame. “I asked Cyber Crime Division to tap into Mr Jung’s network and they managed to extract some very interesting videos. I was waiting for their confirmation when I was lounging on the massage chair earlier.”
“Interesting videos?” She somehow could already guess what that means but part of her dreads to acknowledge it.
“I also saw a pile of very questionable CDs hidden inside your closet. I’ll be frank but you’re suck at it. I saw the boxes the first thing when I checked your closet. You need to learn to hide your stash better, old man.”
“But why here in the living room?” What sort of weird kinks does this old man has? The thoughts send shivers down her spine, goosebumps all over her skin.
“Oh, he does it everywhere, alright. I saw a handful of hidden cameras in his bedroom, shower and kitchen too.” The male detective sniggers, resting a hand on Mr Jung’s shoulder to give the man a pitiful pat. “This whole apartment is a voyeur cave. So, old man, has we had enough proof yet? You have two choices here, really. Let’s come clean with your pathetic attempt of insurance fraud or should we try for unlawful surveillance as well? I’m pretty sure the ladies have no idea they were being recorded. The choice is in your hand.”
Oh, well, looks like they won. “Fine. I did it. Getting ladies to willingly sleep with you requires a hell lot of money. Home video business isn’t doing very well because free porn is everywhere on the internet now. I need the money!”
It barely half a day since they started investigating the case but they are about to close it already. No wonder Sehun is dubbed the best detective in their precinct. Despite his personality, he is actually a damn good cop and a damn good detective. Even to the smallest detail, he would notice it. He has very trustworthy and reliable gut feeling too. “By the way, Mr Jung, while you spend time rotting behind bars, can you lend me your massage chair? I really can’t get over this thing. My butt feels awesome sitting on its fancy leather seat.” …and he has just to open his mouth.
“Did you actually get the massage chair in the end?”
Sehun stops typing and whirls around in his chair, skidding right to Minseok who is sitting one meter away from his desk. The older male’s eyes are huge and shining with curiosity. From where he heard about the massage chair and Sehun’s obsession about it, he has no idea but it is not surprising considering everyone in their department gossips like it is their second occupation. Who wouldn’t like a good tea, really?
“Sadly, no. The suspect’s insurance company came in afterwards with their own forensic team. They’re crazy thorough, I tell you. They sprayed the entire apartment and UV-lighted everything. Guess what they found on the leather seat, hyung.”
“He filmed on the chair too?” It is comical the way Minseok’s eyes grow wider, but Sehun is still too devastated from the news to enjoy the sight.
“Like a second skin, hyung. Fully lathered. It’s like a sperm party. Do you hear me? Sperm party! I imagine he liked his ass being massaged at the same time his dick is.”
Minseok facepalms. He saw Mr Jung when patrol brought him in a few days ago and he really could do well without having the mental imagine of the man going at it on a massage chair. “Oh, god.” He is used to Sehun’s random spewing of weird thoughts, but it does not make him immune to it. Sehun is a great detective. He is meticulous with his work, solved the most cases in their precinct but his thoughts are very… creative. And wild. Everyone in their precinct, especially the Special Crime Unit, is already accustomed to his antics. They stopped questioning him and just let he does whatever he wanted, including their Captain. As long as he got his work done, he said. “Thankfully they decided on full forensic investigation, or else…”
“I had to burn my outfit from yesterday and showered like three times. I can still feel the jizz on my skin.”
“You didn’t actually get any of the jizz on, Sehun.”
“It’s easy for you to say, hyung!”
Just before Minseok gets to reply, another figure comes into the picture, towering over the two male detectives. It is the chills running down their spine that makes them look up, staring at their newly appointed Detective Squad supervisor, Sergeant Park Chorong. Do not get tricked by her pumped cheeks and twinkling eyes or even her baby voice. She can easily take a man down and break bones like potato sticks. Her mere existence holds so much power and intimidation that it sent even their commanding officer cowering in fear.
“I’m very happy to see two of my detectives having a healthy morning debate rather than actually getting works done.” Both Minseok and Sehun gulps in fear before scrambling off to their computer. Chorong clears her throat then turns to face the bullpen. “Captain asked me to deliver a message. Our morning briefing will start an hour late. He’s still with the big guys. They’re going over some official documents for the new detective transferring to our precinct. It was a sudden, urgent transfer so there are a lot of uh, messy things to sort.”
“A new detective?” Kang Seulgi pipes up in between huge stacks of papers and files, some slide down her desk and onto the floor but she pays it no mind. At the moment, the only thing that matters is the news their sergeant just delivered. “We’re getting a new detective? How come I have no idea about this?”
“You would if you actually read your emails instead of swimming in your reports. Seriously, how long do you need to finish even one?” Jongdae deadpans, where Seulgi only reply with a glare before returning to her work. She needs (more) time, okay.
Chorong rolls her eyes, grabbing her sling bag and looking ready to leave. It had been a busy morning for the management. Human Resource Department upstairs is close to losing their mind. The transfer is too sudden and in such haste. Since their captain would not be available until at least another hour, she has to take care of the precinct for the time being. “Anyways, I already asked the janitors to move in a desk. We’ll be adjusting the space a bit but he’s going to sit opposite to Sehun.” She pauses and turns to squint at the said detective. “I expect you to be on your best behaviour. Are we understood?” It is the murderous glare. Sehun has no choice but to succumb and nod hastily. Satisfied, Chorong takes her leave.
“Hear ho, hear ho!” Not a minute passed after the lift door closed, Sehun jumped onto his work chair, addressing the member of the bullpen. “Do you know what I am thinking right now?” At this point, everyone knows whatever coming out from Sehun’s mouth would be crazy ideas but it just makes them even more excited. Other than gossiping, they also love playing dumb games. “Let’s play ‘guessing’ game on the new detective. We take on his visual, physical, personality and meh, achievements.”
“I know what your heart desire, Oh Sehun, but no one could be as weird as you are.” Minseok lazily states while skimming through a robbery report in his hand. It was two years ago when Sehun suddenly came up with his desire to find a protégé, so he can teach the person all his prank tips. Two is better than one, he said. Minseok sincerely thinks their precinct could not afford having two Sehun at the same time.
“Here’s a fact I know: he’s from Busan.” Here comes the gossip queen, their police admin aide, the unbothered Son Naeun. She literally is unbothered to actually does her job. Despite being the aide or in other word, everyone’s assistant, she barely ever assists everyone and that includes her own big boss. Whenever someone tries to come over to ask for her help, say; to photocopy files or something like that, she would shoot them with hole punchers or staplers before they could even open their mouth. However, when it comes to juicy gossips, she would fight to get the first seat. “You know, a typical Busan man, and not to mention years on the force, he is without doubt would be bulging with muscles. He’s probably so ripped his shirt buttons are constantly screaming and struggling to hold on.”
“You’re exaggerating.”
“No one asked for your opinion, Kang Seulgi.” Naeun fires back easily, her hand up showing a palm to Seulgi. She makes a show of rolling her eyes before making dreamy face again. “He also received honourable merits for four times already. How awesome is that. Bulging muscles, handsome suave and lots of bling-bling on his shoulders. Oh, shit. I want to marry him.”
“Sure, marry him.” Baekhyun suddenly chirps out of nowhere, also looking very amused as he continues watching Naeun in her drama queen mode. “What if he turned out around our captain’s age? I mean, four merits? He must have been serving the force for quite some time, huh. Even our diligent baby Sehun only received it twice.” Sehun, now back sitting on his chair like a proper human for once, makes small agreement noises.
Instead of looking conflicted as Baekhyun hoped for, Naeun grins smugly and waves a brown file high in the air. “I know I look like world supermodel and like I don’t belonged here in this nasty dump but I’m actually Captain’s secretary. I have his file.”
“Oh, damn.” Joohyun jumps onto her feet and scrambles to where Naeun is, attempting to grab the said file. “Let me look at his photo!”
“Nu-uh.” Naeun shoves the file into her drawer and locks it with a golden key, smug grin still tight on her lips. “It’s confidential. Besides, I already pulled out his photo. I’ve started my collection. I’m building a shrine for him because, you know, he’s a fucking God.”
…and they say Sehun is the weirdest one in this precinct.
The morning briefing does start later than usual as per Chorong’s notice. However, the detectives are all jittery and excited to welcome a new colleague, one who is rumoured to be legendary (and very hot, apparently), they could not focus on getting any work done so they decided to flock early inside briefing room. The ‘guessing’ game is still ongoing. They are exchanging theories and making up stories about the new detective. Naeun, on the other hand, refuses to cooperate. She has both arms folded to her chest, arrogantly watching them making wild guesses. She is very content with the fact that she currently holds more information than any of the detectives.
They are in the middle of a debate when Chorong marches inside, wearing her trademarked glare. Their captain is in tow, calm as always, he pads slowly to the podium and stands facing his squad. The crowd shut up immediately, giving the commanding officer their full attention. “For the first time in the three years I’m commanding this precinct, this is the first time I’m seeing you guys behaving when a superior walks in. I’m not sure if I should be proud of this achievement or get creeped out because there must be a reason for… this, right?” Captain Lee Donghae raises a sceptical brow, questioning.
“You’re not far off wrong, Captain.” Naeun chirps from the second row. She is required to join morning briefings to jot down the minutes but really, no one ever seen her bring any kind of notebook or even a pen. No other officer was brave enough to say anything while the detectives could care less. “We’d like to save up on your nagging about our work etiquettes today and proceed with introducing us to the new meat. As you can see, the detectives are very eager.” She sends him a pointed look. “Let’s wait no more. C’mon, Captain. Chop. Chop.”
Instead of wasting time reprimanding Naeun, Donghae proceeds with the main topic of today’s briefing. “I’m sure you’re well informed about this matter already due to the email blast yesterday: we’re welcoming a new detective to our squad today. It’s an urgent transfer and we received a very, very short notice about this. It’s quite a havoc upstairs in the HR and not to mention, our HQ is having a field day too. We finally got cleared half an hour ago, which explains why I had to postpone our briefing today.”
“Oh, for god’s sake, Captain. Please cut the chase.” Jongdae groans dramatically from his seat. The nerves are getting to him and their captain is not helping. Chorong sends him a glare, meanwhile Donghae only chuckles at his detective’s antics. He is used to it now, well, pretty much.
“You might’ve noticed that the detective is not with us right now. That’s because he got um, stopped by the officer downstairs. So, I’m kind of killing the time while waiting for them to release him.”
The short notice transfer news spread like a wildfire throughout Seoul precincts, especially in NPA HQ. It is suspicious with the way it was rushed, so it naturally became the only thing everyone talks about. Some took the liberty of digging into the matter and they somehow found out the spectacular achievements and polished career of the transferred detective. A lot of officers taking interest in him, and that was the reason why they got bombarded the moment they stepped into the building earlier. Donghae might managed to escape the flock but his new subordinate was unable to.
“I can’t believe they dared to put their nasty little fingers on my hero. I’m going to go get him.”
“Sit down, Naeun.” Chorong is quick to stop her. It might not look like it but Chorong and Naeun had known each other their entire life. They grew up in the same neighbourhood, went to the same schools and Chorong was the one who got Naeun her job. In short, she is the only one who can control Naeun, which most of the time she chose not to. It is fun to watch her detectives getting shoved around by Naeun, plus Naeun’s antics are very entertaining. “He’ll come up soon. Let’s go through active cases while we wait.”
“But Sarge, we’re all too hyped. I don’t think we can focus.” Joohyun jumps in, trying her best to sound convincing. “We got a guessing game going on too and I put on some good money for this. Please.”
“I did too! And I am very confident about my guess.”
“Oh, shut up, Seulgi.” Naeun hisses from her seat. “You guessed that he’d have a nose. Do you think NPA would accept Voldermort working with us? Of course, he’d have a nose. Your bet is void.”
“But…”
Seulgi didn’t get to finish because there was a knock followed by the most gorgeous man she had ever seen walking into the room. The room fell into a dead silence.
Sehun, mostly, has lost all his ability to function like a human being. Heck, he almost forgot to breath. There is this loud thumping in his chest and it is making him uncomfortable. The unknown figure is now standing next to Donghae by the podium, looking so good that it sent Sehun’s heart into the biggest turmoil he had ever experienced his entire life. Six feet tall, body build that put models into shame, mop of fluffy brown hair, plump lips, and eyes holding the entire galaxy. Fuck, he’s fucking gorgeous. Sehun has this sudden urge to get on his knees… to do something.
‘Damn. Naeun wasn’t lying,’ Sehun mumbles under his breath. ‘Look at those bulging muscles. His buttons must have been screaming so hard. It looks like a real struggle to keep his shirt together.’ The world doesn’t seem to matter anymore as Sehun shamelessly rakes his eyes up and down the delicious man in front of them. That was until he felt a hard kick on his shin. “Ouch. What the hell?”
“I’m saving you.” Minseok whispers harshly under his breath. “It’ll be hard to explain once you already started to drool onto the floor. We don’t want you to lose some merit before you even get to start making a move on him, do we?”
“Who say I’m going to make a move on him?”
Minseok rolls his eyes so hard Sehun is afraid they might fall off the sockets. “Oh, please. Do you think I’m seven? I saw you… god knows what kind of images you had in your head when you were ogling him?”
Sehun grins. “The boner triggering kind.” Minseok makes a disgusted face. He could do without the details, thank you very much.
A loud faked cough brought their attention back to the front. Chorong sends them a pointed look, one that made them both curl in fear. Sehun hopes no one caught his conversation with Minseok because even though he denied it just now, Sehun really is planning to make a move on the gorgeous man.
“My name is Kim Jongin. I came from a precinct in Busan, moving here in exchange with a promotion to first-grade detective. It is my first time in Seoul so I’m still not very used to this new environment. I hope everyone would take care of me. I’m looking forward to working with everyone.”
“Question!” Donghae secretly crosses his fingers behind his back when Naeun suddenly jumped in. Please don’t ask weird question, please, please, please. “How do you love your omelette? The soft and fluffy inside or the hard, firm one?”
“Um…”
Sehun takes pity on the new detective who is very obviously taken aback. Who would expect to get omelette question during your introduction? Besides, who would care about omelette preferences? As long as it is made from egg, not burnt and is edible, it is a pass in his book.
“I don’t think…”
“I’m sure you can ask a far more brilliant question like what is his first impression of Seoul?”
“And I’m sure no one cares about your opinion, Kang Seulgi.” Naeun glares at the said lady. “How is my question not brilliant? I’m putting up a Kim Jongin trivia section on my blog and I am sure my one-thousand readers would love to know how he like his eggs done.”
Jongdae grimaces. “I’m sure there’s a better way the phrase that.”
“Enough!” Chorong’s voice thunder across the room. The detectives shrink into their seats, meanwhile Naeun grins triumphally. “Detective Kim, please don’t get creeped out by my detectives. They might be like this but their works are magnificent. I hope you’ll have a great time residing with us.” Donghae hums in agreement beside them. The three of them exchanged polite bows before Jongin walks down the aisle to find an empty seat.
“We still have to go through our active cases.” The captain adds. “Oh, but before we go through the briefings… Detective Oh. Can I trust you showing Detective Kim around the building after this end?”
“Why wouldn’t you trust me? I’m like the most trustworthy human being in the entire police institution. Heck, maybe in the entire justice system!”
Donghae clicks his tongue. “Okay, maybe Baekhyun can do it.”
“No, no, wait. Don’t be such a pickle today, Sir. You know I was just joking. I’ll show him around.”
When they finally started with case briefing, Minseok leans in with an annoying sneer. “I thought you’re not interested in making moves.”
“I’m not.”
“Seemed quite desperate there, just now.”
Sehun makes a loud huffing sound and pouts at the older male. “Shut up, hyung.”
As he was ordered, Sehun takes Jongin on a quick tour around the building. Since they are already on their floor, he decided to start from there.
“So, to make it short, our squad is made of six detectives. Seven now including you.” They are standing by Jongin’s new work desk, facing the rest of the bullpen. “Over there, that’s Byun Baekhyun. He has quite an interest with fashion so don’t be shocked if you were to see him walking into work with um, unique outfits. Opposite to him is Kim Jongdae. They’re best friends, super tight and super loud. They got into random fights a lot too so if that happened, just try not to be in the middle.”
God, now that Sehun is describing his squad out loud, he realised how weird and chaotic they are. He really does hope this wouldn’t scare Jongin off. To the man’s credit though, he seems more amused than scared.
“The one next to them is Kim Minseok. We’ve known each other since our academy days so we’re very close. You can say that he is the most normal person in our squad… Anyways. That lady over there is Bae Joohyun. She’s a fresh graduate from KNPU so she’s very eager in the field. If you happened to get assigned with her, try to lead her silently in the background. The one with her is Kang Seulgi. She is very by the book and I think she probably has a bit of OCD. For some reason, she had been on a constant beef with Naeun – the lady secretly watching us from behind the books.”
Jongin laughs as they wave at Naeun, who pout at them and throw the book right onto Seulgi’s face. “Ouch.”
“Right, before you became a victim of that,” Sehun gestured to Seulgi who is crying out of pain. “Naeun is our admin aide, yes, but do refrain yourself from asking for her aid. Really. Even though she’s supposed to assist everyone here, she never really did anything of that sort. Unless she offered. Back when I just joined, she threw a stapler gun right on my nose because I asked her to photocopy my report. She has a very good aim.”
Since they are done with the squad members, the two detectives leave the bullpen and starts making way around the rest of the floor. “Our interrogation room is down the corridor. We have only one on this floor, right next to line up room. You can find more rooms on floor three and five. We have our own evident locker too but it’s only for active cases. If you needed to look for anything for cold or old cases, we have a bigger evident locker in the basement next to armoury. Then the basic stuffs – there’s our kitchen, break room, holding cell, copy room and briefing room. I guess that pretty much covered it all. Any question?”
Only when Sehun stops talking that he notices Jongin is staring at him instead of looking around the floor. There is a confused look on his face. Sehun bites his lip, feeling guilty.
“I’m so sorry. Did I go too fast?”
“I was just trying to digest everything. There’re so much information to absorb.”
“It’s okay. It’s just your first day here. I’m sure you’ll get used to everything soon. Besides, if you don’t understand anything or if you had question, you can always ask me. We’ll be sitting next to each other, yeah?” Jongin nods eagerly and smiles so brightly, Sehun has to look away for a moment. Damn, he is getting smitten with this man really hard, really fast. “A-anyways, I’m asking this out of pure curiosity and it’s totally fine if you didn’t want to answer – why did you get transferred here? On such short notice too, like it was so urgent?”
Jongin shrugs, leaning against the wall and shoves both hands into his pockets. “Well, I guess I can say that my old commanding officer couldn’t stand my presence there anymore. He wanted me gone ASAP. The board couldn’t just move me around this far so they offered a promotion instead, since I’m qualified for it already and what-not.”
“Your old captain? Did you piss him off or something?”
He hears the man heaves a sigh before standing up straight again. Shrugging, Jongin answered. “I guess, sleeping with his wife did piss him off, real-bad.”
There is a loud crashing sound, Sehun is not sure if someone smashed a window open or if it was just the sound of his heart breaking. “You slept with your captain’s wife?”
“On my defence, I was dead drunk and how was I supposed to know she was his wife? He never introduced her to us and if you asked me, she looked more like his daughter rather than his wife.”
“Ah, I see. So, you’re pretty much of a player, huh.” Oh Sehun, stop doing this to yourself.
“I don’t normally sleep around. Work had been keeping me busy. Like I said, it was dead drunk and she seduced me hard.”
Sehun manages an awkward laugh and pats the man on his shoulder. He needs a moment to process this. “Hey, listen. I’m just going to get a bathroom break then we’ll continue with the tour, okay?”