“What the fuck is going on in here?” a new voice roars, and Seokga could throttle Officer Shin Korain as the haetae rushes in, taking in his destroyed room with furious eyes. A tense moment of silence passes as Korain absorbs the destroyed monitors, the ripped chairs, and the waterfall of files flowing from the upturned cabinets.

“Officer,” Somi tries sweetly, batting her eyes in a way she must have learned from Hani, “I promise, this isn’t what it looks like—”

The attempt at charm fails miserably. Korain’s face contorts into a vicious sneer as he stares at Somi. “You. And you.” He’s seen Seokga. “Everybody—” He glimpses Hwanin, and his face turns even more blue than before. “Come with me.”

It’s a broom closet.

A large one, yes, but they’re being held in a broom closet. Seokga does not know if his dignity will ever recover. Korain sits on an upside-down bucket in front of them, arms crossed. What makes matters worse is that this should be an easy escape for Seokga—create an illusion of himself sitting compliantly on the floor, shift into an ant, and scurry away—but he cannot leave Hwanin, and is wary of leaving Somi and Hajun alone in front of a Godly Gossip informant with direct access to the next morning’s headline.

“The baby’s mine,” Somi declares loudly and unnecessarily. Seokga has already seen Korain peer suspiciously at Hwanin’s remarkable eyes. The haetae is smart. And right now, that makes him dangerous. “I am…a mother.”

Seven fucking hells. Seokga refuses the urge to bury his head in his hands. “You’re not helping,” he grumbles.

“Be quiet,” snaps Korain. He’s waiting for somebody.

Seokga hopes it’s not another deity.

Hajun stiffens. “Don’t talk to her like that,” the idol retorts, and his usually soft voice is harder than Seokga has ever heard. Somi is sitting on the floor next to him, and he wraps an arm protectively around her shoulders. The gumiho looks amused. It is, agrees Seokga, rather funny. A serial killer being protected by a happy-go-lucky boy-band star.

“My knight in shining armor,” murmurs Somi, but her cheeks are blue.

“Where’s Kisa?” Korain glares at Hajun. “Aren’t the two of you usually attached at the hip?”

“She’s not involved in this,” Hajun replies quickly. Too quickly. Korain frowns.

Seokga watches in disgust as Hajun snaps his mouth shut. As the god of trickery, he is both horrified and embarrassed by Hajun’s lack of deceitful capabilities.

A moment later, the closet door opens, a sliver of light creeping in along with the black-haired serving girl Seokga knocked over. Chaeyeon.

For a moment, Seokga is so relieved that it’s not a member of the pantheon that he fails to realize how bad this might be.

He is trapped in a broom closet.

With Godly Gossip informants.