Chapter Text
“What a cunt.”
It was a beautiful late afternoon. The sea was buzzing with its dormant strength, the waves were gently drenching the sides of a yacht. Sun was slowly going down on the horizon, coloring the sky yellow, as a gentle sea breeze was coming in playful waves, bringing its sweet and salty essence. The clouds were given a rosy glow by the setting sun. A beautiful and peaceful evening.
The yacht was on a smaller side, yet the type that could easily accommodate ten people if needed. The glossy white surface was almost blinding as it was reflecting the warm sun rays, the sail calmly swaying from side to side.
Inside the cabin, in the part that was for staff only, Sua was having a nice break, just chilling with a can of beer, being pretty much done for the day. She was lowkey annoyed when Gahyeon stormed in, not even looking upset, just done.
Did Sua even want to know what caused the girl to enter the cabin with such a blunt statement? She wasn’t sure, because she was pretty sure she could imagine. It was just around eight hours since they met her highness Miss Toplofty and her best friend Miss Sniffy… and they already got these lovely nicknames. So Sua already had an idea why Gahyeon was fuming.
“I’m not doing this anymore,” she huffed, sitting on a chair next to Sua, crossing her arms. “I’m going home.”
Sua just took a sip from her beer. “We are on a yacht,” she reminded her there was no real escape. She opened the mini fridge next to her and handed Gahyeon a beer. “Just drink it away.”
Gahyeon accepted the can and opened it with a satisfying psssch. “Thanks,” she muttered, taking a sip and then sighing. “I wish they just went to bed already.”
“You know it’s way too early for that. Wanna talk about it?”
“You know Miss Toplofty has been bossing me around all day and now she asked me to bring her a pillow, so I did, but when I got back she no longer wanted it anymore, because apparently I touched it too much with my dirty hands, can you believe her???” Gahyeon ranted, looking triggered. “And that stupid cat of hers hates me.”
Sua gasped in fake appalment, putting a hand over her chest. “Not his royal catness Edgar Nannan Paw!”
“Stupid-ass name too,” Gahyeon pointed at Sua, a little calmer as she took another sip of beer. “I wanna go home. Why am I doing this to myself.”
“Money,” Sua reminded her. “We’re all here for the money.”
“They’re awful people!”
“They pay well. They’re rich. And they’re hot. Obviously they suck, but I do enjoy looking at them though.”
Gahyeon rolled her eyes. “Disgusting.”
Sua shrugged, but before she could say anything, the door to the cabin opened again, and just why did people keep disrupting her peaceful evening? She was done with all her job for the day – the food was all ready, just waiting to be eaten, there was no way anyone needed her to prepare more.
But when Jiu entered, she suddenly got worried that maybe her services were required after all.
“Heyy…” the chief mate started carefully. Too carefully to Sua’s liking, so she just opened the mini fridge again and grabbed another can of beer. Thank god they had so many.
“Hey, chief.” Sua tossed the can in Jiu’s direction and the woman barely caught it, her cute white sailor hat almost falling off.
“I shouldn’t,” Jiu muttered, looking at the beer.
“But you want. You need,” Sua smirked, lifting her own can up.
“So true,” Jiu muttered before cracking the can open. “Cheers, guys. Any food around here?” she asked then, looking around after drinking some of the beer.
Sua shook her head. “All of it is out there with Ms. Toplofty and Ms. Sniffy.”
“Please, let’s not call them that, it’s too mean,” Jiu said, sitting down next to Sua, putting her feet up on the table. Sua frowned as she had literally just cleaned the table, but didn’t say anything. Jiu snickered. “Let’s call them Brianna and Gabriella.”
Sua chuckled, but mostly because the joke was lame rather than funny, while Gahyeon squinted at her. “Why? Who’s that?”
“It’s an ancient reference, kiddo,” Sua told her.
“It’s not that ancient and it’s more subtle,” Jiu said with a smile. But then she frowned. “Wow, I really am hungry, I guess I’ll have to pay them a visit.”
Sua just sipped her beer. “Good luck out there.”
“Are you going to be hiding here forever?”
“Nah, not forever just until we return to the land.”
“That’s like another two days,” Jiu reminded her.
Sua just shrugged. “So?”
“Can I chill in here with you?” Gahyeon asked.
“No.”
“But I can’t stand them!”
“Neither of us can, but we’re getting paid,” Sua reminded her again. “Hopefully they won’t need anything more tonight.”
She must have jinxed it because as soon as she finished that sentence a bell echoed through the cabin. All three girls groaned.
“Why did you say that?” Gahyeon frowned at Sua, who just shrugged.
“I’m about as happy about going out there as you are. Actually, why don’t you go ahead and find out what service they require? After all, I’m just the food provider, they should have plenty of that there.”
Gahyeon got a little scary, when she reached for Sua’s jacket and her fist curled around it, crumpling the fabric. “You’re coming with me.”
“Geez, so dramatic, alright alright,” Sua rolled her eyes, but finished her beer before she got up.
Jiu followed, still carrying hers.
It was nice out there, on the deck, with the sun slowly setting, but the air was still warm, despite being so in the middle of nowhere no land could be seen from the yacht. It was a little scary when Sua thought about it, but she was used to it by now. She had been working on yachts for years by then, though usually it was bigger ships than this one. She usually cooked for at least twenty people and had a whole team at her disposal. Here, it was just her. Though technically, Gahyeon was a part of her team as a part-timer that got hired to do pretty much everything around here that didn’t require piloting the ship. That was the captain’s work. And then there was Jiu who was making sure the whole thing was just working well together, that everything was going smoothly, the link between the captain and the crew, which truly just consisted of two people.
Sua didn’t know who she'd be cooking for when she got the very generous work offer, the customer kept their identity hidden, but she would be extremely stupid to turn this down. She figured it must be someone famous, and it wasn’t the first time she worked with someone of influence, so she didn’t really care, she was sure she could handle it whoever it was. The secretary she was talking about it to also told her it would only require cooking for two women and a tiny crew for a total of three days out on the sea. For money that would normally take her a month to make otherwise? Of course she’d say yes.
At first she met with the rest of the crew, who just like her had very little idea about the identity of their clients.
It was only after they got everything ready, the two mystery women arrived. And just like Sua had expected – they were kind of a big deal. Lee Siyeon – an heir to a multinational hospitality company that manages and franchises a broad portfolio of hotels and resorts, brand ambassador for Dior, face of their lipstick campaign, but also a frequent face on tabloids’ front pages, be it for her most recent drunken escapade, alleged family beef or a dating scandal involving some highly desirable actor (or actress). She was absolutely stunning and obviously very much aware, so it took Sua just one second to figure out she was not going to be treated as equal by her. And the sad part was – Sua just accepted it because somehow, it made sense, everything about Siyeon screamed superior. Also the money was still worth it.
However, if Lee Siyeon seemed intimidating, the vibe only doubled when she was joined by her best friend, Handong. Handong was royalty. Well, maybe not really, but she definitely made everyone around her feel like she was. The IT girl of this era, most followed influencer on every social media, model, make-up artist and beauty content creator with a slight accent that somehow made her even more insanely attractive. She was big. Seriously, her cat had more followers than the president and it also had its own fashion line. Handong’s entire brand was built around her mysterious ice princess image. Just like Siyeon, she regularly filled headlines of all the gossip websites, but mostly due to speculations over her past – no one seemed to know for sure where she came from or who her family was, that’s how good she was with keeping private. But everyone knew wherever she went, Siyeon was nearby and vice versa. Those two seemed to be inseparable.
And Sua, along with the rest of the crew, soon learned that they were also absolutely insufferable. Which should have been expected, really.
And now the two of them were sipping cocktails, wearing practically nothing (especially Siyeon as Handong at least wore a shirt on her bikini, though she clearly couldn't be bothered buttoning it up - not that Sua minded, their looks were easily the only likable thing about them), staring at a phone, Handong frowning a bit, looking very focused, while Siyeon watched her, clearly waiting for something. A gray cat was lazily chilling under Handong’s chair.
“Let’s do this…” Handong said and typed something. “And I’ll just edit this thing here. Now it’s good. Perfect caption for your post,” she smiled, passing Siyeon the phone.
Siyeon looked at it for an unnecessarily long time (who needs more than five seconds to decide whether a caption is good, really? Also her face looked like she was looking at a logarithmic equation, that’s how serious she was about it) before she smiled and tapped the screen. “It’s up.”
“I’ll go give it a like right away.”
Sua rolled her eyes. “You called?” she asked, maybe a little rudely. Actually, more than just a little and not maybe.
Handong pulled her sunglasses lower and looked at Sua condescendingly over their upper edge. “You’re blocking the sun.”
Sua hated that she took two steps to the left upon hearing that. It’s for the money, she reminded herself again.
She and Gahyeon stood there awkwardly, side by side, waiting for Ms. Toplofty and Ms. Sniffy to bark some commands at them already, so they could just be done with this. Jiu seemed to have disappeared in the captain’s cabin after discreetly nicking some food from the table behind the two superstars’ backs. Sua saw her and lowkey envied her.
Then finally, Handong spoke up. “You, shorter one,” she gestured towards Sua. Which was certainly triggering, not because Handong clearly didn’t remember her name (she would have to ask about it to know it to begin with), but because Sua and Gahyeon were the same height. “Is this a pirate ship?”
Sua was confused by the question. “What?” She glanced at Gahyeon who seemed just as puzzled, if not more.
“I overheard the captain talking about a rum. Every pirate ship has a rum on it, doesn’t it? So you go get it from her, so you can make us some daiquiri.”
Sua gaped at her, still taken aback by the audacity.
Siyeon was looking at her like she didn’t understand why she didn’t have the rum in front of her already. “Move,” she told her simply and Sua finally did.
She and Gahyeon turned around and walked towards the captain’s cabin, still too taken aback to even process what just happened.
“Told ya, total cunts,” Gahyeon noted weakly as she reached for the doorknob. “Are we really getting them rum?”
Sua shrugged. “Is there even rum to give? God knows what they heard.”
They entered the cabin without knocking and found Jiu sharing the food she had nicked earlier with the ship’s captain.
Dami looked up, clearly not exactly pleased with the disturbance. She sighed and rubbed her forehead. “What?” she asked. If she tried to hide her annoyance, she failed.
“They want daiquiri,” Gahyeon scoffed.
“And we’re supposed to get it delivered by a drone?” the captain asked snarkily. “We’re in the middle of the sea.” Just like everyone else, she too was completely fed up with the two annoying influencers. Luckily for Dami though, she could easily hide in her cabin and pretend to do important ship things, unlike everyone else who had to actually communicate with Siyeon and Handong.
“Apparently they heard you talk about some rum on deck?” Sua raised an eyebrow.
Dami groaned. “I have an idea, why don’t we just toss them overboard and let them drown?”
Gahyeon pointed her finger. “Excellent idea, I’m in!”
“We won’t get paid if we do,” Sua argued.
“Eh, the satisfaction might still be worth it though, just imagine,” Jiu replied, making Sua reconsider. “Wait, are we bonding over planning a murder right now?”
“Two murders. And it would be a service to society, really,” Dami said.
“We are awful people,” Sua pointed out with a chuckle.
“Yeah, well, they’re worse. So what about that rum?” Gahyeon asked. “I worry that if we take too long, we’re gonna be the ones thrown overboard.”
“Please, they would die without us,” Dami disagreed.
“Without you and Jiu, yes. Maybe even without Sua, but I literally just fetch things,” Gahyeon groaned. “I’m done, I want to quit.” She pouted and sat on the floor right there on the spot.
“Again, we’re in the middle of the sea,” Dami reminded her. “It would still take all night to get back, you wouldn’t get paid and there is a storm happening by the port, it would be dangerous to go straight through it, we’d have to go around it and that would take much more time than just waiting for it to blow over.”
Sua looked out of the window and the sky was cloudy, but there was no storm in sight. They really must have been far from the port.
“What if we go through the storm, throw them overboard and then claim it was a terrible accident?” Gahyeon suggested.
“I’d rather not endanger my yacht, though it’s very tempting,” Dami tapped her chin as if she was truly considering it. “We might actually face some rain overnight,” she added then, pointing at the radar screen as if anyone but her could understand it. Well, maybe Jiu could.
“Let’s still go with Gahyeon’s idea?” Jiu smiled looking all sweet.
They fell silent for a moment as they all once again thought about it. Money or murder? That’s the question. Both certainly had a charm to them, both would make all four of them happy.
“What about the cat?” Jiu whispered then. “We can’t kill the cat.”
“As it wants to kill me, I have no problem with cat violence,” Gahyeon shrugged.
Dami then stood up as the tension grew in the room as the line between jokes and actual murder plan got way too blurry. “There is rum under the deck,” she said.
Sua looked at her, surprised. “Why? Are you actually a pirate?”
“No, but rum is nice,” Jiu grinned. “It’s only like two bottles of it down there though. Dami and I were joking about drinking it all tonight, because obviously you need to get drunk to survive this, that’s what they must have overheard, dammit. Sorry.”
“Okay, let’s go then,” Gahyeon sighed. Sua pulled her back up on her feet and Jiu led the way out of the cabin.
“You! Not captain!” Lee Siyeon’s voiced called as soon as the three left the captains cabin, making them stop.
Sua noticed Jiu closed her eyes for a second before she somehow conjured up an actual smile on her face and looked at the bitch. “Yes, Miss Lee?”
“The wifi keeps crashing.”
“Eh, yes, that’s because we’re far from the land.”
“You said there would be wifi on board,” Siyeon frowned.
“And there is, but there is only so much we can do this far out in the sea, please understand the satellites-“
“I don’t care, make it work,” Siyeon clicked her tongue, annoyed. “And you, uhh,” Siyeon snapped her fingers in Gahyeon’s direction as if she was trying to remember her name. She wasn’t though, as she never asked about it either, so there was nothing to remember. “Generic girl,” she called her eventually, making Gahyeon look super offended. “Get us our clothes, it’s getting cold.”
“And don’t touch it too much,” Handong added sternly, holding her cat from hell in her lap.
Sua could almost feel the angry energy coming from Gahyeon, so she quickly grabbed her arm and whispered to her ear: “It’s not worth it. At least you’re the generic one, not the short one.”
Gahyeon looked at Sua and then said something that warmed the latter’s heart. “We’re the same height though?”
“And where’s our daiquiri?” Handong called out then.
“It’s gonna be ready soon!” Jiu called back, motioning for Sua to tag along while Gahyeon went back inside to get the two their clothes. “You know how to make daiquiri?” Jiu asked Sua quietly.
“In theory… we don’t have any lime juice though, so I’ll just use lemon. It’s gonna be sour, but sucks to be them,” Sua grimaced.
“Yeah, well… Got your phone?” Jiu asked then randomly.
Sua patted her pockets. “Uh, yeah?”
“It’s super dark down there, I’ll need the flashlight and I didn’t take mine.”
“Alright.”
Sua hadn’t been under the deck yet. Whatever storage room was under the trap door they were standing on looked lowkey scary to her. Maybe because it was under a trap door. That just didn’t seem quite right on a yacht such as this one, a modern, fancy one.
“What else do you guys keep down there? Powder kegs?” Sua asked then, half joking.
“It’s a tiny storage, mostly tools, spare shit…. And booze,” Jiu grinned, but then frowned as she opened the trap door. “Huh, weird, we usually lock this. I guess Dami was in earlier. It’s too tiny for both of us to fit comfortably, you stay up here and just be my light,” she said as she started climbing down the ladder.
“Oh I could be much more than just your light,” Sua winked flirtatiously. She meant it, Jiu was hot.
Jiu laughed a bit as she jumped down. “Alright,” she coughed. “It’s way too dusty, I have to tell Dami we need to clean in here. Can you shine the light to your left?”
Sua leaned a bit more to the side, so she could do as Jiu asked her. The light hit a few glass bottles of alcohol (and maybe some other stuff), reflecting back at Sua.
However, to Sua’s horror, the bottles weren’t the only thing reflecting the light in the darkness.
She gasped and almost dropped her phone. “JIU!” she shrieked, but the shriek got drowned in Jiu’s scream as a pair of eyes stared right at her. A demon!
Before Sua could do anything, Jiu grabbed the nearest bottle and tossed it at the two eyes. Sua finally came to her senses and aimed the flashlight properly, revealing a very much human girl. She barely registered the way the booze bottle hit the girl’s chest and then fell to her feel, shattering, the liquid spilling, soaking the wooden floor and the intense alcohol smell filling the tiny storage room immediately.
“Yo, my shoes!” the girl complained, but it could barely be heard over Jiu’s panicky noises.
“Who the hell are you! How did you get here!” she yelled, aiming another bottle at the girl, holding it by the neck, as if it was a weapon.
The girl didn’t seem very bothered, she just shook the alcohol from her shoes calmly, first lifting her left foot, then the right one.
“What is going on here?” Gahyeon’s voice asked behind Sua loudly, startling her.
“I’m not sure,” Sua replied, still bewildered. “We found a person down here.”
“Yeah, hi. Now if you could get that light out of my face please?” the girl then asked, looking up, shielding her eyes with her forearm.
Sua lowered the light. “Explain yourself,” she demanded though.
“Can we climb up there to talk?” the girl asked.
“No,” Sua replied right away. “You stay where you are. Jiu, you come up here.”
“It’s dirty down here.”
“You have already been down there for a while, you’ll survive a little longer.”
Sua stood a bit aside, letting Jiu climb the ladder back up. It was then when another person joined them by the trap door.
“What happened? The two cows heard you idiots screaming and yelled at me to immediately go check if everything was alright?” Dami said, looking at Jiu.
“We have a trespasser,” Jiu replied and Sua used her phone light to shine on the said girl, who just awkwardly waved at the captain.
“Hey. Sorry about it.”
“Who are you?” Dami asked sharply. “How did you get there?”
“I’ve been trying to answer those questions, but new people keep coming before I even got the chance.”
“Well, now’s your time,” Dami said.
“Name’s Yootony. I broke in, obviously,” the girl shrugged.
Sua laughed. “That’s a stupid-ass name.”
“Yo, that’s not really important right now,” Jiu told her quietly.
“It is kinda stupid tho,” Gahyeon chimed in, supporting Sua.
“Yeah? It’s my alias, I think it’s pretty sweet, I came up with it myself, do you have one?” the girl snickered in a manner Sua didn’t appreciate.
“I do, in fact,” she replied back, trying to sound annoyingly casual.
“Why did you break in, Yootony?” Dami kept asking relevant questions.
The girl shrugged. “I often sleep over at the docks, many ships are easy to break into. I chose this one randomly, but overslept. By the time I woke up, we were already out in the sea. I thought I’d just hide in here until we went back to land. Can I go up now?”
“No,” Dami refused, her hands on her hips.
“Oh come on, I’m not dangerous.”
“Be quiet,” Dami turned to Jiu. “We need to talk about this before making any decision,” she whispered.
Sua bent down and closed the trapdoor with the girl still down there, before stepping on it, ignoring the loud complaints (and some swear words) echoing from below her.
“What are we going to do with her?” Dami asked again, looking at all the other women.
Gahyeon just shrugged. She didn’t seem very interested in making any decisions.
Jiu however, spoke up: “We can’t keep her closed in there for two more days.”
“Can’t we?” Dami wondered. “We’d bring her food here and there. She clearly planned to do that to begin with anyways.”
“I’m with Dami on this one, I can’t even imagine what the reaction of the two would be if they found out we have a squatter in here,” Sua agreed.
“I don’t like it,” Jiu sighed. “I don’t want to keep her in there against her will.”
“Let’s just ask her then,” Sua suggested, stepping away from the trapdoor and opening it again. “Hey, you down there, are you willing to stay there for two more days? You better say yes.”
Yootony didn’t seem too excited to say yes to the suggestion. “Well… if my only other option is to swim to the land, then I guess,” she grimaced. “It’s not like I have a real say in this, is it?”
“Yeah, you really don’t,” Sua replied, looking back up at Jiu and Dami, silently asking what they should do.
Suddenly she gasped in shock when she felt something rub against her calf. She looked down to find no one else but of course his royal catness Edgar Nannan Paw purring contently by her feet.
“Oh my god, it likes you, that’s scary!” Gahyeon uttered in pure shock.
However, Sua didn’t really care about that at all, she was more concerned that the presence of the cat clearly meant that the owner-
“What is going on here?”
-was standing right behind them.