~Chapter 3 - Cubicle Warfare~

            After war has been declared, the warring parties will do whatever they deem necessary to defeat the opposing side. From deploying the very best of their fighting power to win fair and square, to using unconventional tactics for an unprecedented victory, the process doesn’t matter – the outcome is the most important thing to consider. That is what both Luhan and Sehun think anyway.

            As their fingers type away at their laptops as if they were programmed to do so, their minds are preoccupied with devising ways to ensure their own promotion. Of course, that included ways to sabotage their opponent, to directly eliminate the competition. Just when all the other employees at the office thought that the feud between Luhan and Sehun couldn’t possibly get any worse, since the two have declared war on each other, the office really has become a sort of war zone for the rivals.

            “What are you typing there, sparkle lump?”

            Luhan doesn’t even flinch at the name-calling. He’s grown resistant to it now; he has to be in order to hide his points of weakness and defend himself. Sehun rolls his chair back to peer into Luhan’s cubicle, where the older man positions his body in front of his laptop so that the younger wouldn’t be able to see anything. Luhan knows that Sehun is watching him, and he does the same thing to his co-worker. They keep a close eye on each other to prevent any more “pranks” from being pulled (but it is more like sabotage at this point).

            “A thank you letter, you anchovy.”
            “Oh really? Who are you writing it to? Your cousin? For that hideous girly stapler?”

            “No. I’m writing one to you, actually.” Luhan slowly turns around in his seat, and Sehun is slightly disturbed by the grin the other man has on his face. “To thank you for allowing me to get this promotion so easily. I couldn’t do this without you.”

            Sehun narrows his eyes at Luhan, and the latter mirrors it (still grinning in that disturbing manner). “Don’t get ahead of yourself. You can keep writing that thank you letter though. You’re going to be writing one anyway when I become your superior and correct your slacking ways.”

            Luhan is smirking now, and it strikes Sehun’s nerves. In fact, Sehun is so annoyed by Luhan’s expression that he promptly rises from his chair, walks right into a protesting Luhan’s cubicle, and slams the laptop screen shut on the older man’s fingers. He can tell that he did it pretty hard too, because a somewhat withheld scream emerges from the back of the victim’s throat.

            “You…!”

            Sehun returns the favor with a smirk of his own. “That was for tying my shoelaces together. We can get as physical as you want, Luhan. I’m obviously the stronger one of us anyway.”

Chanyeol is passing by when he happens to pick up Sehun’s words. He shoots the arguing pair a wide-eyed look. “Whoa there, not here. We already have enough of that with our bosses.”

            “It’s not like that!” Sehun and Luhan shout at Chanyeol simultaneously, and the tall man simply shrugs and continues on his way to his own cubicle.

            Once Chanyeol is gone, Luhan returns his attention to Sehun, fiercely glaring at him. “Just because you think you’ve made it even doesn’t mean that you’ve won! Watch your back, Oh Sehun.”

            “Same to you, Xi Luhan.”

            With those warnings exchanged, Sehun immediately returns to his cubicle to continue coding the data that Suho had given him earlier in the day. However, he is totally unsuspecting of the figure silently looming behind him, until a pair of hands come crashing down on the back of his laptop screen and smash the screen onto his fingers. Sehun lets out a yelp and whips his head around just in time to see Luhan walking back to his cubicle. He growls, pulling his reddened fingers out and standing up.

            Instead of walking into Luhan’s cubicle, Sehun makes his way around it, directing himself toward the area where all the cords and outlets are. He crouches down and locates Luhan’s (the obviously pink cord), wraps his fingers around it and pulls. On the other side of the room, he hears Luhan shriek, out of anger, horror, or both.

            Luhan’s head pops up from his cubicle, and his usually cute face scrunches up as he sees Sehun standing where the power station is. “You brat! What’d you do?!” The other employees groan softly to themselves as they hear the beginning of another loud argument.

            “My bad. I tripped.” Sehun answers nonchalantly, dropping the pink cord in his hand. By the time Sehun has returned to his cubicle, Luhan scurries over to the power station to plug his cord back in. Of course, he has to return the favor, and he pulls the first blue cord he sees. He cringes to himself as he hears Kai panicking, and he quickly sticks the plug back where it belongs. He pulls the other blue cord and turns around. He smiles in satisfaction as Sehun’s narrowed eyes peek out at him from his cubicle.

            Luhan is sure that Sehun would only come back to unplug his laptop if he left the power station, so he decides to linger there until one of the bosses do their usual check-ups every hour. It was a brilliant plan: he would remain here and make sure Sehun’s laptop stays off until it was check-up time, then he would return to his smoothly operating laptop while Sehun’s was off – which would lead the boss to think that he was slacking off.

            Luhan quietly laughs to himself as he steals a glance at Sehun’s cubicle. The younger man is no longer glaring at him, but there is no way for Luhan to tell whether he’s sitting at his cubicle or carrying out some evil sabotage plan of his own. A worried Luhan contemplates for a while whether to risk leaving the power station to see what Sehun may be up to, but when Sehun’s head pokes out from the top of the cubicle, Luhan feels a sense of relief.

            From the corner of his eye, Luhan sees Kris sauntering out from his office. That’s his cue to head back to his cubicle, so he sneaks back as quickly as he could without getting detected by the tall blond man. Luhan lets out a sigh of relief as he safely makes his return, sitting down in his chair and scooting forward.   Unfortunately, he was too concerned about getting back to his cubicle to take notice of his surroundings, so when he finally did, it was much too late.

            Kris walks by Luhan and Sehun’s area to inspect their progress, and he stops dead in his tracks and even reverses once he passes by Luhan’s. At the same time, Kris and Luhan discover what is pasted all over the walls of the latter’s cubicle: several pictures of Sehun making bedroom eyes and sly smirks at the camera. Luhan is too shocked to make an audible reaction, so Kris does it for him.

            “Luhan! The cubicles are considered company property! You are vandalizing it by posting Sehun’s pictures all over it like this! I expected each and every picture to be removed by the end of the day! Aside from office-related matters, I am moderately disturbed.”