Chapter Text
“So.” Dokja leans across the table, the cold brew in his plastic cup sloshing around as he sets it down. “How exactly is this meeting place secret or anonymous in any way?”
Yoo Joonghyuk gives him a grunt in response, expression indecipherable from under his black face mask and baseball cap. “Didn’t say it was secret.”
It just so happens to be the busiest time of day at Dokja’s favorite coffee spot, which is quickly about to lose that designation because Yoo Joonghyuk is ruining any good feelings he had attached to the place.
“How have you not been caught yet?” he grumbles, making eye contact with the barista, who gives him a hesitant nod on account of him being a regular customer. “God, you were right when you said the police are incompetent. This is ridiculous—I could’ve caught you if given the chance, and I’ve never even been formally trained in investigative work.”
Yoo Joonghyuk pulls something out of the inside of his coat and slides it across the table. “Your money,” he says. “It should be enough.”
He picks it up, nearly choking on his mouthful of coffee. “What,” he coughs, coffee dripping down his chin but thankfully not splashing onto the check. “Hey, you bastard, do you have no concept of money?”
Yoo Joonghyuk raises an eyebrow. “Is it not—”
Dokja reaches to grab a napkin from the dispenser, cleaning up his mess. “It’s fine.” He pretends that it’s not more money than he earns in a year working at the precinct, with more trailing zeros than he’s seen on a single check. “Just great. Never been better.”
He looks unconvinced. Dokja pockets the check, making a mental note to go and deposit it at the bank as soon as he’s done with whatever Yoo Joonghyuk wants him to do. Speaking of which—
“What’s our order of business today, Regressor?”
Yoo Joonghyuk scowls. “Don’t call me that.”
Dokja hums in response. “So you’re alright with Yoo Joonghyuk. Is that your real name?”
If anything, that look on his face darkens. “Shut up.”
“Joonghyuk,” Dokja tries, rolling the name on his tongue. “Joonghyuk-ah? Joonghyuk-ie?”
With every name that he offers, the radius of Yoo Joonghyuk’s sphere of murderous intent seems to double.
“Hyukkie?” Dokja finally decides on, grinning at how Yoo Joonghyuk visibly flinches at the name. “Oh, wow, that was a great reaction—”
He stands up, his chair clattering to the floor behind him. “We’re leaving,” he almost growls, grabbing Dokja by the wrist and half-dragging him to the door. Dokja shoots the poor terrified barista a hopefully comforting look before Yoo Joonghyuk whisks him away.
“So, what are we doing, Hyukkie?”
Dokja’s grin only widens when he notices Yoo Joonghyuk’s grip tighten on the steering wheel. “Should I keep calling you that? It’s starting to grow on me, I’ll be honest.”
“Stop it,” he grits out, slamming on the breaks at the red light. Yoo Joonghyuk looks genuinely pissed off—Dokja can almost hear the grinding of his back teeth as he struggles to resist the urge to throttle him.
“Joonghyuk-ie,” he amends, monitoring his reaction. Just a slight twitch in his brow, but not nearly as volatile of a reaction. “You’re okay with that.”
Yoo Joonghyuk gives no response. Dokja takes it as an affirmative. “So, Joonghyuk-ie, where are we going?”
Silence.
“You know, you’re a terrible conversationalist. How are we supposed to trust each other and cooperate if we never talk to each other?”
“Don’t need to.”
“We’re working together.”
“...You’re working for me.”
Dokja shrugs. “Whatever you want to call it. Can’t you just tell me what you’re going to—”
“I’m driving.”
The terse statement kills any desire Dokja has to converse with this statue of a man, and he spends the rest of the ride looking out the window and memorizing the road signs in case Yoo Joonghyuk is planning to traffick him and use his organs to promote his personal ideal of justice.
The car is nice, at least. He was right when he equated Yoo Joonghyuk to Batman—he really is rich, brooding, and good-looking. How unfair.
“I’m not wearing that.”
Yoo Joonghyuk fixes him with a dead stare.
“I said,” Dokja repeats again, the unintended hysterical whine to his voice making him cringe internally, “I’m not wearing that. No way.”
Where the fuck did Yoo Joonghyuk even obtain a…
“Wear the outfit,” Yoo Joonghyuk says, shoving the hanger towards him.
Dokja narrows his eyes. “Wait, is this a kink thing? Because I’m not into that. And besides”—he gestures at his face—”does this look like the face of a Discord kitten to you?”
“...Do I want to know what a ‘discord kitten’ is?”
“You don’t,” Dokja helpfully supplies. “But regardless, I’m not wearing the maid outfit.”
Yoo Joonghyuk lets out a heavy sigh. “Then the deal is off.”
“Why the fuck does the deal hinge on me wearing a sexy maid outfit?”
“Because,” Yoo Joonghyuk says, all slow as if he thinks Dokja suffered brain damage from that fall into the river, “I need you to infiltrate a maid cafe.”
That explains exactly none of the situation at hand. Yoo Joonghyuk’s in the driver’s seat, he’s in the passenger seat, frilly French-style maid outfit between them, and is that a cat ear headband snagged on the gearshift?
…Okay, maybe it does explain some things.
Dokja pinches the bridge of his nose. “Can you at least explain why the maid cafe is at all pertinent to your modus operandi of targeting high-profile crime? Because last I checked, the only crime that’s happening at maid cafes is underage employment, sex crimes, and maybe tax evasion on a good day.”
“We don’t have time,” Yoo Joonghyuk bites out, pushing the dress into his arms. “Change, quickly, and I’ll explain.”
“Here? I mean, you do have tinted windows, but—”
“Just change.”
Dokja raises his hands placatingly. Well, he’ll just have to trust that Yoo Joonghyuk isn’t doing this to spread humiliating photos of him online. He gives Yoo Joonghyuk a scathing look that goes completely unnoticed, and starts unbuttoning his shirt.
Yoo Joonghyuk rests his wrists on the steering wheel, looking out through the front windshield as if to give him a semblance of privacy. It’s not the most comforting, but it’ll have to do.
“The owner of the maid cafe is a rumored pedophile,” Yoo Joonghyuk murmurs, “and she’s said to be running a human trafficking ring.”
“A shocking hobby for her profession,” Dokja quips, shrugging his shirt off his shoulders. “But continue.”
“Since she lives in the apartment space above the cafe, she should keep all her documentation on her”—there’s a slight curl to Yoo Joonghyuk’s lip, is it alright for him to find it a little attractive?—”merchandise somewhere in the apartment space or the cafe. I just need you to retrieve it for me.”
“It’d be nice if you could just break in and steal it.” Dokja tugs the dress down to cover his exposed stomach, and starts unbuckling his belt. “I guess that’s not possible though, since you’re asking me to do it somewhat legally by…wearing a maid outfit.”
Yoo Joonghyuk frowns, still pointedly keeping his eyes focused on a point in the distance. “The owner spends a majority of her time in the cafe and apartment, and takes the documents with her whenever she leaves. So I need you to get in, and I’ll create a distraction on the outside to lure her out.”
“What a great idea, Joonghyuk-ie,” Dokja grits out, struggling to slide his slacks down his legs within the confines of the passenger seat, “but you do realize I just look like a pervert wearing a maid costume, right? There’s no way I’ll make it in and out of the shop without being accosted.”
“That’s what the wig is for.” Yoo Joonghyuk turns around, reaching over his seat and into the backseat to grab something. In the process, he finally looks over at him, freezing halfway in the motion of pulling back.
Dokja follows his line of sight, landing on the frilly skirt barely skimming the top of his bare thighs. Hm. Maybe he guessed right when he said famed vigilante Yoo Joonghyuk had a thing for maid outfits.
“Like what you see?” he asks, intending to elicit some type of reaction. Much to his disappointment, Yoo Joonghyuk says nothing, tossing the mass of faux hair straight at his face and returning to his position of looking out the window, albeit with a marked frown.
Much later, Dokja is standing on the pavement outside Yoo Joonghyuk’s car, fully kitted out with thigh high stockings, a garter belt that digs into the bones of his hips, and the aforementioned cat ear headband.
“I’m going to kill you,” he stresses, “if anyone else hears about this.”
The corner of Yoo Joonghyuk’s mouth twitches. Fuck, is he laughing? “Remember the plan.”
Dokja flips him off as he turns around, his speed of rotation causing the frilly skirt to poof out against his will. God, why anyone is into these things is outside his scope of imagination.
Pulling the door of the maid cafe open, he’s greeted with the sight of actually cute girls wearing maid dresses. Well, they’d be cute if they didn’t all look like they were being held at gunpoint. He spots a few bruises in shades of purple and yellow, a long angry red scratch up another girl’s thigh, the dead look present in their eyes as they smile and perform their little maid cafe scripts. Somehow, it’s chillingly familiar, and he has to remind himself that he’s 28 years of age and in a maid cafe.
“Are you the new girl?”
He turns. It’s one of the workers—clearly senior to the others, at least in regards to age—scanning him from head to toe with a critical look in her eye. Her name tag reads “Erich”, but he’s pretty sure that’s just some alias considering she looks undeniably Korean.
“You’re pretty tall,” she finally concludes, a shadow of confusion crossing her face. “Well, I guess some guys are into that. Just never thought the boss would hire someone even taller than me.”
Dokja hums in response, hoping she doesn’t ask him anything he actually needs to verbally answer. He doesn’t have the skill nor the mental fortitude to fake a woman’s voice.
She jabs a finger in the direction of the back room. “Well, the boss said to start you on dishwashing.” She pauses for a bit. “Oh yeah, ground rules. Don’t talk back—the boss hates it when we don’t listen. Don’t hook up with the customers. Although, I’m pretty sure everyone here has done it when times are tough, so no one will judge—the other girls recommend the alleyway in the back. And, most importantly, don’t go upstairs. Trust me on that last one.”
He hums again in response, and she gives him a strange look. “Huh…I kinda get why she hired you now. What’s your name? I have to get you a name tag.”
While her back is turned, rummaging through the boxes for a name tag, he skirts past her, taking a furtive glance around the interior of the cafe. The other girls don’t even cast him a second glance, too preoccupied with shuttling piping hot coffee and desserts around to the various tables. There’s the sound of oil sizzling in the kitchen, so one other person there. No sight of anyone who could be the mysterious pedophilic boss. He can’t see any stairs to get upstairs, so he cranes his head a little more and—
“Here.”
Dokja blinks, and the name tag and a pen appear in his hands.
The worker sighs. “Well, I’m not gonna keep breathing down your neck, so just come get me if you need help. Just call me Erich.”
He nods, mutely, and presses the nametag against the wall, scrawling something that he hopes passes as a name and not as an incomprehensible scribble.
He nearly jumps when he turns back around and she’s still there, squinting at his nametag.
“Ri—Ricardo?” she spells out, brow furrowing. “Ah, no, wait, that’s a man’s name, right? I guess mine is too, but…is that—”
Dokja nods furiously. Is Ricardo even a reasonable name for a worker at a maid cafe? Well, it doesn’t matter; as long as he can get ‘Erich’ off his back, he can be called whatever she sees on the damn name tag.
She gives him a pat on the back. “Nice fake name. Anyways, I have to get back to work, but get started on the dishes in the back.”
As soon as she steps away, he starts walking over to the room she pointed at. Opening the door reveals a dimly lit room, with nothing but a sink in the center of the room. It’s stacked to the brim with dirty dishes, murky dish water close to overflowing.
Ugh. Maybe human trafficking isn’t the worst crime they’re committing here.
Taking another look around the cafe, he still can’t see any indication of stairs. Damn it, why didn’t Yoo Joonghyuk give him a floor plan of some kind?
Go upstairs, then give me a signal. Yeah, right. He can’t even do the first part of the plan because he has no idea how to get upstairs. Fucking Regressor.
He peers into the room again. Still the same ketchup-encrusted plates, but…
…Is that a door at the back of the room?
He shuffles into the room, making sure to close the door firmly behind him with a click. Sighing, he steps past the dishes he’s supposed to be doing, scanning over the door.
It’s painted the same color as the rest of the room—that is, pitch black, which is not exactly the color one thinks of when they think of frilly maid skirts and cutesy omurice ketchup drawings—which explains why he didn’t catch it on his first look. Dokja tries the handle.
Shockingly enough, it’s not locked, swinging open with a slight creak. Behind it is a set of stairs, leading up into darkness. If that wasn’t bad enough, he can’t tell if the stains on the edges of the stairs are blood or ketchup. Either way, they gleam menacingly in the low light, clearly new enough to not have dried.
Well. Once again, fuck Yoo Joonghyuk. With that calming thought in mind, he closes the door behind him and begins ascending the stairs, keeping his steps light as he fumbles in the dark. It’s been a hot minute since he’s done any kind of field work, so he’s more than a little—scratch that, really out of shape for ex law enforcement. Trying to keep his heavy breathing to a minimum, he arrives at what he thinks might be the top of the stairs, if the way he bangs his knee on the floor by tripping is any indication.
“Fuuu…” he hisses, clapping a hand over his mouth. Through the darkness, he can see a faint rectangular outline of light—maybe another door? God, he’s so sick of doors.
He stays silent for a moment more out of precaution, crumpling his stupid frilly skirt, but there’s no indication that anyone is there to have heard him smash his kneecap to smithereens.
Right, the signal. He sticks his hand up his skirt, grimacing as he feels along the side of his bare thigh. His fingers finally close around the little plastic box, and he locates the button, pressing it once. Then another two times for good measure. It’s supposedly wired to something Yoo Joonghyuk has on him, but the bastard didn’t even bother to explain it clearly before he threw him out of the car.
Wait for her to leave.
He scoots away from the light, until his back hits a corner. He’ll just have to hope the boss can’t see him from this angle.
Then, it happens. There’s a crash from the direction of the door, and a furious scream. “Damn it, none of these fools can get anything right!”
With that, the door is thrown open, casting a blinding amount of light into the space. Dokja squints, and can barely make out the shape of a woman’s long hair fluttering behind her as she storms down the stairs, muttering under her breath. At least she doesn’t seem to have noticed the grown man in a maid dress sitting in the corner.
When she leaves, go into her room. Look for a lockbox.
He crawls towards the light on all fours. The cool breeze on his thighs makes him want to cry out of sheer humiliation. No wonder all the girls downstairs look like they’ve been to hell and back.
The room itself is fairly unassuming, painted in an off-white shade that’s peeling off the walls. There’s a desk, a few file boxes, and a display cabinet of handcuffs and…other implements that probably have nothing to do with his previous job and everything to do with seedy human traffickers and their predilections.
If he was a smart criminal trying to hide their incriminating files in a lockbox, he definitely wouldn’t put them at the desk. So he goes for the file boxes first, skimming through the contents of each. No lockbox in sight, only tax forms and business documents.
Okay, so maybe she’s a really dumb criminal. He goes through the desk drawers next, but there’s nothing but more unsavory items and an unlabeled bottle of translucent fluid that he really, really doesn’t want to know the identity of.
With those out of the way, he stares at the glass display case.
…There’s literally a bright yellow envelope inside, stuffed behind a ball gag and a terrifyingly monstrous and wet-looking dildo. What the fuck did Yoo Joonghyuk mean, lockbox? Maybe he’s the dumb criminal.
He opens the door of the display case, taking the utmost care to not touch any of the items lest he have to chop his hands off after escaping this nightmarish maid cafe. Finally extricating the envelope, he lets out a sigh of relief, closing the case. A quick glance at the contents of the envelope is enough to make him audibly wince. Yep, that’s exactly what he expected, but...wow. This woman is seriously fucked in the head.
Take the lockbox and leave. Make it discreet. Yeah, well, fuck Yoo Joonghyuk and his shitty inaccurate instructions.
Dokja’s about to leave the room when he hears it.
Footsteps, coming up the stairs.
Fuck, fuck, fuck. He looks at the envelope in his hands, and then at his outfit.
Damn his pride.
He shoves the envelope down the front of his dress, and darts behind the door just before it swings open.
The woman from before stomps in, cursing under her breath. Before she can turn around and notice the second pervert in the room, Dokja slips behind her and sprints down the stairs.
“What the—! Who—”
He slams through the dish-washing room and straight into the cafe, nearly bowling over ‘Erich’ who’s holding a stack of dirty plates in her arms.
“Ricardo? What—”
He doesn’t spare her a second glance, booking it towards the entrance with an arm clutching his midsection to prevent the envelope from slipping through his dress.
I’ll be waiting in the alley behind the cafe.
Wig nearly coming off his head, he makes it outside the cafe, whipping his head back and forth. He can hear the woman’s angry spluttering and ‘Erich’’s voice behind him, but there’s no time to think about it. He takes two sharp lefts into the alleyway, scanning for Yoo Joonghyuk’s fancy sleek rich boy car. It’s an easy find, considering the only other things in the alley are a dumpster and two people making out in the back corner.
He stumbles towards the car, pulling the passenger side door open and throwing himself into the seat. “ Drive,” he gasps out.
Yoo Joonghyuk doesn’t need to be told twice, slamming on the gas pedal and nearly committing vehicular manslaughter on the woman. He swerves straight onto the street, hurtling away before Dokja can even get his seat belt on.
“You—you’re fucking shit at distracting people,” Dokja pants, ripping the wig off his head.
His grip tightens on the steering wheel. “...I miscalculated.”
“I almost got caught,” he seethes, peeling the stockings off his legs, “you damn asshole. So much for your immaculate plan.”
“Did you get the papers?”
Dokja scoffs. “Wouldn’t it be funny if I went through all that trouble, wearing this ridiculous skimpy maid outfit, just to fail because you did a shit job distracting the target?”
“Kim Dokja.”
He rolls his eyes. “Relax, Regressor, I’ve got them.” He pulls the front of his dress open.
The car jerks and nearly hurtles into the neighboring lane.
“Holy shit, keep your eyes on the road!” he screeches, clutching at his metaphorical pearls. “Maybe you’re planning to die young, but I’m not planning on being buried next to you!”
“Don’t undress in my car,” Yoo Joonghyuk seethes, clenching his jaw.
“I fucking did that already when I changed into this stupid outfit, you goddamn bastard!”
“...Don’t undress when I’m driving,” he amends, frowning as he adjusts their lane position to something more legal. “Your clothes are in the back. You can change when we get there.”
Dokja frowns. “Get where?”
Yoo Joonghyuk sighs a sigh that seems to imply he regrets not killing him when he had the chance. “To my base.”
“That’s such a rich vigilante thing to have, a base—”
“Shut up.”