Work Text:
“Where’s Section Chief?” Yeongeun asks, the twinge of annoyance in her voice imperceptible to anyone who doesn’t know her well.
The only other person in the office is a new hire, hopefully one that will last longer than two months this time. It’s getting really hard to find new places around her desk to keep name-tags, but it’s the least she can afford. It also has the added benefit of pissing off their section chief every time he sees it, so really she just keeps winning.
He fumbles around a bit, almost falling over before he answers: “He went outside for a smoke break!” The clumsiness this new hire displays is almost endearing, but it’s more worrying than anything else.
Yeongeun glances at the clock. “And this was?”
“Ah. Half an hour ago, around?”
She blinks in shock, not sure if it's more concerning that the newbie continues chattering on obliviously, or the concept of a 30 minute long smoke break is more concerning. Does Section Chief Viper even smoke? She’s never once smelled the acrid notes of tobacco on him, nor has she seen him smoke. In fact, the man’s been asked for a lighter, and refused almost immediately—although, she wouldn’t put it past the man to be the type to say no just because. Still, thirty minutes for one cigarette. Unless… Unless Baek Saheon is a chainsmoker, and a slave to his addiction!
She’s just being a good underling and checking in on her boss that’s been missing for a concerning amount of time, Yeongeun justifies to herself as she makes her way to the exit leading to where their office workers usually go to smoke. Whether she finds notions or happenings of anything untoward is something of little consequence, and definitely not the purpose of her journey.
Yeongeun pauses outside of the door. Section Chief Viper is annoyingly perceptive; she’s more than certain if he’s paying even the slightest amount of attention he would notice a crack in the door, Yeongeun having bore witness to his cunning on more than one occasion. Meaning she has no choice but to use other means, at least for now. Yeongeun presses an ear to the door, pulling her hair out of the way to hear better.
She doesn’t actually expect to hear anything, after all only freaks talk out loud to themselves (though Baek Saheon is strange and disturbing), and so the muffled sounds of conversation almost startle her into speaking herself.
‘What?’ Yeongeun mouths as she presses closer to the door, palms laying flat as she strains to hear exactly what is being said. She hopes the newbie wasn’t entirely incorrect, and she’s about to get walked in on by their actual chief. That would be immensely embarrassing, and something she’d never recover from. Thankfully, as her focus sharpens enough to make out what’s being said, she can recognize the voice of her bitchy section chief. And Yeongeun almost immediately retches.
Because who the hell is he talking to in that awkward, semi-sweet tone of voice?
In Baek Saheon terms, it’s basically him saying “I love you honey, oh won’t you please come here and give me a kiss!” Just the thought of it makes Yeongeun gag a second time, almost upheaving her entire lunch.
She should have held off on thinking she'd been shocked enough, as Yeongeun almost falls flat on her ass as she listens on.
“Are those bastards trying to overwork you again?” He clicks his tongue. “You should know that they’re not allowed to make you work that many hours, yeah, why don’t you say something?”
This is Viper? The same Viper that told Yeongeun if she couldn’t make her way out of the Darkness on time, she didn’t deserve to go home anyways?! The Viper that’s run through several newbies by overloading them with paperwork? Viper who’s either seen as an angel or satan reincarnated by the employees at Daydream based on how much time he’s spent with them… That Viper?
And another thing! Who in the world is Baek Saheon speaking in such soft, dulcet tones? She didn’t know his voice was capable of dipping that low, or the harsh edge of his words softening enough to land like snowflakes as opposed to hail.
“It’s the same old here.”
The person on the other end speaks some more words, ones that Yeongeun is unfortunately unable to catch through the thick barrier of the door. Tch, why doesn’t Baek Saheon take his calls on speaker, that would make this so much easier.
“No,” he laughs (he can do that without being sarcastic?), “I'm an amazing boss. Something those fools at the bureau wouldn’t know about.” Another pause in dialogue. “You tell me if they’re mistreating you, I know you don’t pay attention to things like this.”
Yeongeun has half a mind to whip open the door and launch into an hour long rant about how Section Chief Viper is the biggest liar in the world to the unwitting punk on the other end, who’s somehow been deceived. She can’t fault them too much, though, as Baek Saheon does startlingly well disguising his nature to anyone who isn’t privy—as a snake does, Yeongeun supposes. She stops herself in time, but not after her hand twists the doorknob. She freezes. These doors… it’ll definitely make a noise if she releases it. That’s just amazing. She’s trapped here eavesdropping on her lovesick boss and his high-school-esque phone call with the lover in question.
It is intriguing, though, that he mentions a bureau. Of course, it could be any number of bureaus, but the one that immediately pops up in her mind… No, it’s probably not the Disaster Management Bureau. No Daydream employee in their right mind would get involved with an agent from the government agency knowing their intense vitriol for how the corporation operates, and that applies to Baek Saheon more than anyone. Although there was that kind agent that helped Yeongeun out in the Darkness she entered recently, despite knowing that she was with Daydream. She was sure that he was the exception, no other agent would deign to give them the breath to explain themselves, let alone talk like this on the phone.
Yeongeun relaxes her shoulders, having resigned herself to being trapped here for as long as it takes for her to slowly release the doorknob without making a noise and alerting her boss she’s been invading his privacy for the past however long. Actually… How long has it been? If he’d been gone for half an hour before Yeongeun started listening, has he been on call this entire time? Viper being whipped… The concept is almost comical.
“That Darkness? It’s—” He’s interrupted by the person on the other side (Yeongeun has now grown fairly certain it’s a man), and adjusts shortly after, “yes, that Disaster, I got it.”
- His placating tone. (His version of one.) What the hell?
- Disaster? It is a DMB agent. Holy shit.
In her utter shock, Yeongeun unwittingly makes the slightest movement forward and pushes the door. It only moves a bit, but it’s enough to remove the barrier and allow Saheon’s voice to spill past the entrance in startling clarity. She immediately covers her mouth with her free hand, but moments pass and their conversation carries on the same as before… Did the Viper not notice the door opening?
More important, though, is the fact that Yeongeun doesn’t smell even the slightest bit of cigarette smoke. Which, if you’d have been smoking for almost an hour at this point, you’d be reeking of the stench—Saheon hasn’t smoked at all, then. She knew it! She knew Section Chief Viper wasn’t a smoker.
Oh. Oh god, that made his disappearance all the more disgusting. He was so down bad it was sickening, this feeling was like walking into a room and seeing her grandparents having sex. She never wanted to think of Viper being romantic again. Worse still, his next sentence made her blood run cold.
“Grapes, are you seriously…” Saheon sounds frustrated, but in the way only someone who cares about you would be. “I told you not to do that type of dangerous crap on your own!”
Now… Surely, even though Baek Saheon was talking to someone who referred to Darkness as Disaster, worked at a bureau, and was called by a certain nickname… Surely he wasn’t speaking to that Agent Grapes. The kind agent who had gotten Yeongeun through the Darkness and asked for nothing in return! That bleeding heart is with this pit viper? Yeongeun has little time to process the earth-shattering news she’s just unearthed before she registers that they sound as though they’re nearing the end of their call.
She ever so slightly drags the door towards her, allowing the knob to slowly rotate back into place. Yeongeun winces at the slight click, though with the way Section Chief Viper had been waxing poetic to… to Agent Grapes, she wonders if he would even register it. Yeongeun sure as hell hopes not, she’s got enough to deal with without him breathing down her neck about keeping hush-hush on his secret relationship.
She fast-walks back to her desk, praying that the door opening in the distance isn’t the door leading to Viper. The newbie nods as she sits down at her own desk, paying respect to his superior.
“Did you find Section Chief Viper?”
Yeongeun almost hisses at him to shut his filthy mouth, but she very valiantly refrains and pivots almost immediately to cover her ass.
“What are you talking about?” She furrows her brow in contemplation, waiting only a few seconds before continuing, “Oh! I went to the washroom.” Yeongeun shrugs. “Figured chief would come back when he comes back.”
“What’s this about me coming back,” Saheon questions with a raised brow as he enters the room. He doesn’t seem like a lovesick idiot, but Go Yeongeun knows the truth now.
“Oh,” Yeongeun pulls a pile of papers from her desk, “I had these for you to sign off on, that’s all.”
He grunts. “Leave them on my desk. I’ll get to them when I have time.”
Aaaaand. Back to ‘pretentious asshole’ it is. Yeongeun withholds a long-suffering sigh and gets back to work.
Now how to convince Agent Grapes that he should dump Baek Saheon’s sorry ass…