Chapter 7: Bailed

Sure Minseok could be a hardass sometimes, and he wasn't exactly the nicest person in the world but he always seemed to be there when Mercie needed him.

The officer who she had now known as Kim Junmyeon slid the door open with a clang and gestured for Mercie and Lay to step out of the holding cell.

Not too far off was Minseok looking visibly annoyed, tapping his foot impatiently with his arms crossed. Junmyeon meekly stepped back beside his with his hands folding behind his back.

Mercie faintly wondered exactly who the police officer was in this situation, Junmyeon or her boss?

Mercie hung her head and tucked a coil of hair behind her ear, awaiting his oncoming scolding. Instead he came closer, hands lightly touching her shoulders and examining her face, trying to read her eyes. 

"Are you ok? You're not hurt?" His eyes were widened in worry. Mercie blinked a bit surprised at his gesture. 

"I'm alright, just glad you're here" she admits. It was true, what would she have done without Minseok? Most likely have to call her Mom to come bail her out. Or even worse, she'd have probably been stuck with her pet-turned-human dunce for 32 hours. Not exactly how she wanted to spend her day. 

"Good." He released the grip on her shoulders and sending a small nod to Junmyeon, effectively dismissing him. Junmyeon retreated back to his desk across from Jongdae.

"We're on double duty today." He held up a paper bag with a high end department store name on it. "Unless you forgot?" He tilted his head in question. 

"I have my own clothes" Mercie dead panned. It was just a press conference, what was wrong with going with her office clothes?

"You forgot" He shook his head with a frown. "This is for the kickoff party tonight. You're going, you volunteered remember?"

Suddenly it dawned on her that the Launch Party that Minseok had mentioned in conjunction to the Press Conference was, in fact, a Party Party. Which meant that Mercie would have to be wearing the appropriate attire, party clothes.

Mercie begrudgingly took the bag and pawed through it. She pulled out a slinky looking black dress and glowered at Minseok.

"No way I'm wearing this" 

"What? There's nothing wrong with it. It's a nice fabric, not too short either." He blinked up at her confused, "Unless you wanted it shorter?" Something about the way he said that made Mercie think he was trying to get a rise out of her on purpose. She chose to ignore him.

There was nothing wrong with the dress, in fact it was rather tasteful. But the price tag attached to it was more than her monthly rent and deposit combined. She winced.

"You know, most people take the tags off the gifts they give." 

"It's not a gift, I'm taking it out of your paycheck" He smirked. But before Mercie could shout any expletives, he cut her off. "I'm joking, it's from wardrobe. Just don't get anything on it, we have a photoshoot next week."

"Of course" Mercie said with a bit of resignation.

Xiumin peered around her. "Has he been here the whole time?" He said dark colored eyebrows raised in suspicion. "Who's that?"

Mercie whirled around to see Lay, busily gnawing at the bars of the holding cell. He ceased upon seeing Mercie and smiled happily before bounding over to them. 

"He's...uh..." Mercie struggled to find the words to say. What exactly was he? It's not like she could explain that he just appeared in her house after transforming into a human from a puppy. "He's my...."

"PET!" Lay says proudly sticking out a hand to shake. Must be a new trick he learned. Mercie lets out a little shriek swatting away Lay's hand and putting a hand forcefully over his mouth.

"NO! No no no no. He doesn't know what he's saying, he's my pet...sitter is what he meant to say." It was a bit of a lame excuse but she hoped that Minseok would at least pretend to fall for her rather transparent lie.

"He's not wearing shoes" Xiumin noted after his eyes flitted briefly to Lay's feet. After all this time spent trying to get shoes for him, he was still hopelessly shoeless.

"He just came from the hospital, he's high on painkillers. PLEASE ignore everything he says" She desperately explained away. Xiumin only stares at them bewildered.

"I see..." He says after a beat and clears his throat. "Jongdae can you take him home?" Xiumin called behind him.

Mercie handed Jongdae a slip of paper with her address that she had torn off from the official precinct stationary and gave it to Jongdae from the passenger' window of the patrol car.

"Just make sure he gets home safe, he's not that smart" Mercie said. Jongdae gave the paper a once over before slipping it into his shirt pocket, mumbling something about being a police officer and not a taxi driver.

Mercie ignored the officer and shifted her attention to Lay in the backseat. She lowered her voice, "Just go straight back to my apartment and STAY" She watched Jongdae drive off, with Lay waving goodbye excitedly from the back window. 

Xiumin started backing out of a nearby parking space, awaiting for her to join him in the passenger's seat of his luxury car. 

"I didn't take you to be the type to find trouble" Xiumin drove with one had on the wheel and another dangling coolly from his window. He was wearing Givenchy shades.

Mercie sighs sinking into the plush leather seat. "I don't. Trouble finds me"

Xiumin dropped her off rather unceremoniously in front of the City Atrium. He drove off saying he hard some work to take care of, leaving her with her bag of clothes and a pen and notepad. She tied up her hair as best as she could and entered the Atrium.

She wasn't surprised when she had seen two tall (much too tall) bodies striding towards her with smug looks on their faces. Mercie almost had half a mind to walk in the other direction to avoid them, but unfortunately their legs were much longer than hers.

"Where's the rest of your crew?" One of the tall men had practically shouted to her as he walked closer. His brown hair was slicked into a perfect coif. Wonder how much time he spent in the mirror that morning?

"It's just me today Reporter Park." Mercie nods in acknowledgement to the other tall man-boy beside home. "Mr. Oh"

"Mercedes" 'Mr. Oh' said back in greeting. He always chose to say her full name rather than Mercie, which ticked her off.

They stood in front of each other for a while until it became uncomfortable. Conversations between rival companies weren't the easiest to have, especially since they were reporters from "Businessweek".

"Don't choke" Reporter Park says finally before brushing past her to get to the coffee shop in the atrium. 

The world of entertainment reporting was more like something out of Game of Thrones with a mix of psychological warfare. Mercie straightened her blazer and strode confidently into the conference room. She wasn't going to lose to them.