[IC] E:\cyberpunk\the_deadliest_question.exe

[pugbutter]

"Sir, is something wrong?"

Jules had attempted to pretend that he did not just flinch; the applicant could not hear the feedback screeching from the earpiece, but his reaction betrayed the possibility that she was being eavesdropped upon after all. "Nothing that concerns you, Ms. Boulanger," he said, hoping in retrospect that that didn't sound too pretentious. "One of my chips needs a calibration. I've been getting headaches all month. Anyway, you'll receive a call soon!" They shook hands, and Jules saved his sigh for when she had left the room.

Of course she wished, through the shrinking crack of the door, that he'd get better soon. He feared that Ona was there to hear it, the final nail in a casket stuffed with insult. Jules returned to the control room timidly as a dormouse, but seeing that she was not there, unwound substantially in the shoulders.

"Maybe the next one will be a handsome guy. Then she won't be so uptight," he grumbled. The handler nodded awkwardly, but hesitated to slander anyone, not when they could walk back into the room any second now. She'd wait til the patchers' backs were turned to start smearing their gossip across the offices. The nod was one of acknowledgement, then, not agreement.

He saw that the coffee was gone. He didn't think to look in the wastebasket, so he assumed the tornado of stress female hormones was carrying it away to another work station; she was shuffling another pile of paperwork like a deck of cards, or at the very least, grabbing another applicant. She had ten minutes, he decided to himself, before he'd do it himself. The assistant needed some practice anyway. It wasn't protocol, but the arteries of protocol were already so fatty and clogged, who would notice?

Jules glanced sidelong. The girl paid too much attention to him, shifting little glances his way when she thought he wasn't paying attention. Then there were the cameras. He couldn't sneak a drink in the blind spot yet, so he twiddled his thumbs, pretending to be bored instead of claustrophobic and anxious, that any sufficient amount of bulletproof glass and chromasteel paneling existed in this building to protect him from the wrath of woman scorned. Frankly he hoped she'd just unload it all on him quickly. Get it over with. But more realistically she'd resent him for weeks now; subtle sabotage following his every step.

[DarknessDawning]

When Ona pushed open the door to the waiting room too firmly and it flew back, hitting the wall with a smack, she effectively drew the attention of every person in the room without fail. With her face firm with annoyance she had a bit of a sickly witch look to her... her skin nearly translucent where it was exposed between the matte leather wrap shorts that were too small and the puffy backless top that was too large. The stares from the candidates and the front desk receptionist were just a tad awkwardly long and Ona's pride and self loathing quickly reminded her that she was both being judged, and had not properly prepared this morning.

The change in her face betrayed her most fatal weakness and she stepped in to the room a tab more humble, lowering her eyes to the floor and softening her stance, becoming small and insignificant. "I'll take the next candidate back. Mara, please go ahead and send them back every 15 minutes until noon, then we'll break for lunch and return at one." The receptionist nodded and waved at the next person in line, a short, plump older woman. The rest of the candidates all glanced at each other, seemingly trying to calculate who would make it in before lunch and who would be left waiting an hour before interviews started up again.

Ona lifted her face enough to smile pleasantly at the next candidate. At least there was no reason for Jules to take a liking to this one... She might as well be his sister... or an aunt. Besides, Jules seemed picky with his preference of women. Ona couldn't remember the last time she'd seen him out with anyone, but she somehow imagined him with a nice, warm, attractive girl who always took him to her place instead of going back to his. She held the door open for the woman, and stepped through behind her, letting the door fall shut silently. "Good Morning, right this way."

It was only a couple of minutes before the familiar click click click preceded Ona down the hallway. The door to the interview room opened and the new candidate stepped in, the slightest view of Ona waving a hand to direct her to her seat before the door closed again. Then Ona was at the door, opening it to enter the small cell from which they observed. Somehow she hadn't necessarily expected to walk in to the sight of Jules. She paused, the set of her jaw firming slightly and her eyes flicking over the trashcan before she cleared her throat and stepped to the desk, picking up the next folder. "Perhaps I should take this one... give you a chance to warm up this morning? Or would you like to keep going?" She paused with the folder hovering in her hand halfway between them.

[pugbutter]

He saw no way of winning this. If he refused then he demonstrated a clear bias toward the younger and prettier applicant; he proved that lipstick and low-cut shirts could sway him. If he volunteered then he'd just make things worse again, and continue doing whatever he had done to anger her, since it was a thing lost on him, occurring at a different tier of understanding than that on which he operated.

He didn't know what she was trying to prove, but she'd done it. She'd won whatever game she was playing in her head, a game whose rule-book she refused to let him read; or in which he was illiterate. She'd won. His will to be helpful, to be outspoken, to socialize and to volunteer selflessly, was sundered. Already he felt his cocoon healing from the wounds, and growing thicker. That would teach him for trying to break free.

"Do what you want"? No; too aggressive. "Go ahead," he said, bringing the earpiece to his head, plugging it in there. Armed with a nonchalance in the fluidity of his arm, he set out to prove it didn't hurt. He turned away from her, watching through the glass and into the other room.

Why couldn't it be easy? As easy with Ona and his other rare friends as it was with the people in the interview chairs, between the sterile white walls. All he would need to do is——flip a switch. Set the Emotional Attachment dial down to zero, work his magic, get what he wants out of them, and then discard them like a boring wallpaper. He wished he could do that. He wished it was as easy for him as surely it was for the hand-shakers, the boot-kissers, the bad-joke-snickerers at the very top of the company, where their suits were designer-brand and tailored immaculately. Where they earned enough money to fill any holes burned into their chests. But for a lowly little termite like him, one of the millions gnawing at the wood-pulp of the city, it could only ever be a wish.

[DarknessDawning]

It was true… he couldn’t win. Refuse and he was sure to confirm that today he was simply out to defy her… here on this day where she already looked a strange sort of mess that perhaps he still couldn’t place as her outfit reused from the day before and second layer makeup drying and caking over old make up that had never been washed off. If he accepted, then he merely confirmed her assumptions that he was weak minded and easily distracted by cute little things. Something stung her more about the second option. Perhaps the issue was that she didn’t feel like he was distracted by her. He was one of the few constant people in her life; someone that she saw on a daily basis and yet their relationship had never developed beyond professionalism and perhaps casual dishonest friends.

His statement was so quick and brief, she failed to catch herself before her lips curled in to a half amused, half annoyed smirk and she huffed with a sad form of victory… like the sigh of being punched in the gut after purposely antagonizing someone. She knew it was coming, but that didn’t make it hurt any less. She picked up the ear piece and fitted it in place. ”I thought you might say that.” Without another word she turned and made her way through the sally port in to the interview room. The older woman on the other side had been distractedly staring at the walls and snapped to attention uncomfortably when Ona appeared. Perhaps she was hoping that someone more approachable would have come through that door. Instead she was left with a sleep deprived oddity that was already pushed to the edge of her tolerance for annoying creatures for today.

”Ms. Nalluen, My name is Ona.” She held her hand out to briefly, stiffly shake the woman’s much more plump digits awkwardly. ”We don’t have much time, shall we get started? … I reviewed your file. You’re a transfer applicant from Convergys? Please take a moment and tell me about your current position and why you’re interested in changing companies.”

[pugbutter]

And thus the applicant went off on her long and meandering road, patched together from platitudes, euphemisms, and business jargon. Jules was glad suddenly, actively glad, that by striking a vein of sheer good luck, he had managed to avoid occupying the same room as this regurgitator of other, smarter people's half-digested ideas.

She knew exactly what Ona and her team of brain-dead business-casuals wanted to hear. With wanton glee she wielded accusations of "being unable to pursue" her "passion" in that environment, although everyone knew damn well that Transcomm offered her nothing which Convergys couldn't. (A fifty-fifth story office, maybe; admittedly their headquarters was bigger and nicer, built with money which its employees' health plans and life insurance policies doubtlessly did not deserve.) She followed that parry with a pirouette, like how being surrounded by "nontrepreneurs" frustrated her over there. By the time she'd begun to speak about "alignment issues" in her team's list of priorities, Jules realized he had begun to feel sorry for Ona, being chained down in a chair next to that reservoir of verbiage. Would taking an axe to the bulletproof glass between the two rooms save her from drowning in it, or would Ms. Nalluen just flood both compartments in equity, like the iceberg which brought low the mighty Titanic?

"I don't need to tell you how this bullshit grates on me," he mumbled into the mic, finger pressed firmly to the talk feed. He made sure to say it when the applicant was speaking, so he could be sure Ona would not miss anything important. But realizing that, of course, literary creativity was not one of Transcomm's hiring criteria, Jules took a lazy glance down at the woman's papers. He suspected everything was in order so far, but with such thick layers of sugar and frosting smeared over her messages, they served to confuse and obfuscate more often than to communicate and clarify.

No, not sugar. Not frosting. Jules realized she would have tried to eat them if that was the case. Looking up from the papers he tried to count the number of chins wiggling between jaw and collar bones.

"Everything checks out so far," he felt confident enough to say after a moment's attempt at translation—confident despite the con-artist cant on her tongue, designed to hide how very vacuous the whole process was. "Ona, let's ask about her personal life. Find out more about her family and her hobbies, and all that fairytale stuff." That, he knew, is where her real motivations would lie: wanting to spend more time with the kids? Needing more money for her drug habit? No one cared about "synergy" when they slipped out of their ties and dress-slacks at the end of the work-day. It was time to cut through the gristle and get straight to the meat underneath.

[DarknessDawning]

A few seconds in to the woman's rant Ona began to gravely regret having thrown out Jules' gift. Transfers were always scrutinized more deeply, and this woman obviously had practiced what to say, but Ona found herself having a hard time staying focused against the monotone drone of her voice. She imagined being at home... taking a hot shower, and crawling in to her bed for the next several days while pretending like she no longer existed to the outside world. Jules' voice snapped her out of it, and for a moment she cleared her throat and straightened up a little more in her seat. This was her job, and she needed to be perfect at it. Her reviews depended on making the correct choices.

When Jules prompted her questioning Ona's eyes narrowed briefly. One side of her wanted to ignore his suggestions. He didn't bother to put the little girl against those same standards. Clearly he was nit picking this woman because she wasn't attractive. At the same time, it was his job to direct her currently. Perhaps he saw something that she wasn't remembering at this moment. She'd gone through so many files last night, they all were somewhat blurred together. She cleared her throat again, pushing a small smirk to her lips as she held up her hand for the woman to pause. "I apologize Ms. Nalluen, but in the interest of time... Can you remind me... are you married? Do you have kids? Tell me a little about your home life."

It wasn't the warmest way to move the interview forward, but they only had another 5 minutes or so before the front desk girl would be sending the next body their way. In Ona's anger she'd set them a rather grueling schedule for the day. It was her own way of numbing herself really. It gave her no time to think about anything else.

[pugbutter]

Jules heard the woman's reply only vaguely. Her strongest and most distinctive words, "son" and "babysitter" and the likes, leapt at him; not as an army of words organized into rows and columns like soldier-ants, but singular little bodies acting with no queen's mandate. All her context slid off the waxy varnish glazed over his brain.

Someone else had spoken into the feed; the voice belonged to a male. Jules' heart thrashed in his throat, struggling against its bindings.

"Sorry, sir. Could you repeat yourself?" he asked.

"Mr. Elliott, we see that Ms. Ví clocked in at 7:58 this morning. Is she there?" He sounded thin-worn.

"Yes, sir, she is."

The voice was so hard and cold, like a snow-crusted lamppost. It belonged to a man of copper wiring, surely, who did not hesitate in swinging down his brass fist upon his underlings. "At the nearest convenience, tell her to come to my office," he said. "'Please.'"

"Yes, sir," Jules said, but the feed had cleared again just prior.

With alarm stabbing at his entrails, Jules checked that the mic was off; that the button had not stuck, and that nothing weighed it down. He wanted to be sure that Ona had not heard that, and although she hadn't, that only meant it was in his power to tell him. No; it was his duty. (What "choice" did he have? To do what was expected of him, or to freeze and wither like the other alley-slimes, while a hundred applicants lined up to replace him and two other patchers had to filter those hundred down to twenty. Rotten bastards; that's why good people do rotten things!) He peered like a gumball-thieving child over his guilty shoulder, toward the camera looming above. Intimately he felt the walls of the room pressing up against his tender flesh, suffocating and crushing it, and the glass of the camera lens slicing at his delicate peace of mind.

He pressed his hand to the mic at last, though hesitating to press down on the button, it rested listlessly upon the flat base awhile.

"Ona, if you want me to continue the interviews without you, tap the table three times with your index finger," he said. "Uh, Mr. Skovgard wants you in his office. Immediately."

Immediately. That's what "at the nearest convenience" means to a man in a suit, a man who signs paychecks.

[DarknessDawning]

Ona started to zone out again as the woman began rambling on and on about her new subject matter. If she were hired, she'd probably bore her coworkers to death. Outside of that, nothing was striking Ona as particularly troubling. Transfers were always scrutinized closely, but at least this woman wasn't talking up all the ways the company could give her extra benefits if her skirt was short enough.

The ear piece clicked on again and Ona's eyes snapped back in to focus on a spot on the wall behind her charge... Jules' first statement confused her. She thought she was fine. There was no reason to switch out, but then her body stiffened with his second statement. Her color dropped out and her heart skipped a beat. For a moment she forgot to breath. Her hands grew clammy and she drew them in to herself quickly. Ms. Nalluen easily noticed the change. "Are you alright? Ma'am?"

Ona cleared her throat and forced a quick smile. "I'm fine. Uhm... I think we have enough information. Thank you for your time. Please return to the front desk. You'll receive a call within 3 - 5 days for follow up procedures." She was already moving as she spoke, pushing her chair back and not bothering to shake the woman's hand on her way out as Ona retreated through the door to the observation room, leaving a surprised and confused woman behind to navigate her exit on her own. Ona tried to not look panicked as she pulled off her ear piece and set it on the desk in front of Jules. "I... uhm. Well I shouldn't keep him waiting should I?" She cleared her throat again, feeling it suddenly clench shut as though she'd swallowed a dozen allergic triggers at once. "Don't wait up... there's a lot to get done today. I wouldn't want to fall behind schedule. "

For a moment her eyes meet Jules', and the stupid spat from before simply melted away. No matter how this day went, or how many times he annoyed her... Jules had been one of the only constants in her life for a long time. She loved him in her own way. She couldn't stay mad at him. Her face softened, knowing that the strain in his voice was concern. "I'll see you in a few. " She hoped the comment of reassurance was enough to calm him some as well.

Ona stepped out of the room with a growing feeling of sickness in her gut. Why? And why today? Of all days, she knew that she looked a bit off today. She wasn't fresh and cleaned up and to the level of presentation that she would want to be if she'd have known that she was going to have to meet with the big bosses. She swallowed at the lump in her throat again, her hands mindlessly picking at her outfit to elongate her sorts, adjust her top, and generally attempt to improve her appearance as much as possible. As she passed by the front desk she snatched a tissue and carefully blotted at her makeup to ensure that it looked as fresh as possible. She waited at the elevators, barely containing her urge to run frantically from the building. The ding made her stomach flip again and she stepped in, her heart racing to the point that she was sure it was visible through her chest.

The speed with which the elevator rose was dizzying and when the doors opened again, Ona feared she might faint. She took a deep breath and stepped out, forcing a confident smile to get face as she stepped up to the assistant's desk. "Good morning, my name's Ona Vi... Mr. Skovgard called for me..."

[pugbutter]

"You must be Ms. Ví. If you’re ready then he'll see you right now."

Oozing with a great smugness, almost to the degree of flippancy, the secretary's eyes slid from her lap to her desk's computer screen, and then from that place into Ona's face, cavernous with makeup which dried and peeled in layers like sedimentary rock; ancient, geological, as measured in the calendar of the workplace, where a proper woman would rather arrive in a toga and laurel wreath than in yesterday's belt-dress (that dreaded modifier, yesterday, indicating a fashion too stale to be new and exciting, but still too young for quaintness and historicity). Between her minimal makeup, her squared, boyish clothing, and the fickleness with which her locks of hair could not decide whether they wanted to stay in the bun or fall playfully to curtain her face, the girl-woman's aesthetic screamed mousey and meek and girl-next-door, and undoubtedly her handler devoured this ploy with gluttony gleaming at his teeth. Ona knew better. She knew that even though, when she passed the desk, she saw that the girl's lap was empty, and her computer screen was set to the snowy glare of calendars and spreadsheets, the secretary spent most her day cackling at her "friends'" fashion mistakes on social media, staving her boredom away with her favorite pastime, schadenfreude. Further, she knew this girl flung at her perhaps the most vicious, venomous insult she as a modern woman could conceive: pretending not to notice the many flaws in her grooming.

Skovgard, too, carried plastic airs about him. But his, somehow, had a penetrative quality, gentle and frictionless as they slithered through Ona's mental blockades. For one, he was perhaps the last man on civilized earth who still wore glasses, rather than plastiglass retinas, or even the contact lenses which themselves were much outdated, but which at least bestowed the invaluable gift of modesty. The feebleness of his eyes was something he felt no great urge to conceal, not when they had withered away in fleeing from the wrinkles which conquered his face, and the grey which commandeered the fine, wispy hairs both on his scalp and his silky chin. His suit, like the rest of him, was old-fashioned and stuffy, but it only augmented the grandfather’s woolly must which he wore like a thin mask of cologne, a subtle change in the hues of his atmosphere.

"Just a moment," he said in his accent, rich and thick like custard. He had cast his gaze sidelong, toward a sputtering machine near the far edge of his desk. "For all our technological prowess, we still haven't learned how to make our printers do what we want of them." The machine wheezed and writhed as it tried to comprehend his orders.

[pugbutter]

"Good morning, Ms. Ví. He's ready if you are. Go on in."

Oozing with a great smugness, almost to the degree of flippancy, the secretary's eyes slid from her lap to her desk's computer screen, and then from that place into Ona's face, cavernous with makeup which dried and peeled in layers like sedimentary rock; ancient, geological, as measured in the calendar of the workplace, where a proper woman would rather arrive in a toga and laurel wreath than in yesterday's belt-dress (that dreaded modifier, yesterday, indicating a fashion too stale to be new and exciting, but still too young for quaintness and historicity). Between her minimal makeup, her squared, boyish clothing, and the fickleness with which her creamy locks of brown hair could not decide whether they wanted to stay in the bun or fall playfully to curtain her face, the girl-woman's aesthetic screamed mousey and meek and girl-next-door, and undoubtedly her handler devoured this ploy with gluttony gleaming at his teeth. Ona knew better. She knew that even though, when she passed the desk, she saw that the girl's lap was empty, and her computer screen was set to the snowy glare of calendars and spreadsheets, the secretary spent most her day cackling at her "friends'" fashion mistakes on social media, staving her boredom away with her favorite pastime, schadenfreude. Further, she knew this girl flung at her perhaps the most vicious, venomous insult she as a modern woman could conceive: pretending not to notice the many flaws in her grooming.

Skovgard, too, carried plastic airs about him. But his, somehow, had a penetrative quality, gentle and frictionless as they slithered through Ona's mental blockades. For one, he was perhaps the last man on civilized earth who still wore glasses, rather than plastiglass retinas, or even the contact lenses which themselves were much outdated, but which at least bestowed the invaluable gift of modesty. The feebleness of his eyes was something he felt no great urge to conceal, not when they had withered away in fleeing from the wrinkles which conquered his face, and the grey which commandeered the fine, wispy hairs both on his scalp and his silky chin. His suit, like the rest of him, was old-fashioned and stuffy, but it only augmented the grandfather’s woolly must which he wore like a cologne, a subtle change in the hues of his atmosphere.

"Just a moment," he said in his accent, rich and thick like custard. He had cast his gaze sidelong, toward a sputtering machine near the far edge of his desk. "For all our technological prowess, we still haven't learned how to make our printers do what we want of them." Somehow the empty chair yearned for her even without his invitation to sit upon it. The machine meanwhile continued to wheeze and writhe as it tried to comprehend the electronic imprint of his iron fist.

[DarknessDawning]

Ona despised that secretary. She had no concern for her personal appearance... her hair sticking out all over the place, her skin oily and porous exposed for everyone to see. Her clothing was plain and simple, as though a thrift store was all that she could afford. It was undignified for a woman in her position. It was a poor representation of the company and of her boss, yet that wasn't Ona's call. There were too many moments where Ona almost wished that she would work every job in the company, just to relieve herself and the company of the plethora of underqualified, worthless leaches that latched on to it. She smiled politely at the girl and let herself in to the office without another word.

Still, as the door slid closed behind her, letting a cool breeze pour across the visible bones of her spine, Ona's pride and anger both fell quickly. She suddenly felt sick and regretted eating breakfast until she remembered that she hadn't. She held her breath for what seemed like an hour before he acknowledged her. She smiled and nodded briefly. "Yes sir, absolutely, take your time." She paused, watching him and the printer and fighting the simultaneous urges to run forward and figure out how to fix it or to start scratching her exposed skin until she bled with nervousness. In the end she settled on an offer. "Would you like me to have your secretary call for a serviceman?" She smiled warmly again, reaching back for the handle of the door in anticipation.

[pugbutter]

But Skovgard raised his tender hand, and shook the willowy mosses dangling from his chin. "I swear, IT is trained to create as many problems as they solve. They must think they'll lose their jobs once there's nothing left to fix," he said. He was right not to worry, anyway, as soon enough the machine had begun to vomit forth the contents of its wiry stomach. "Ah. Good." The paper was snatched away before Ona could inspect it in any but a precursory way, but catching a mere glance of it, she saw that it depicted a colored line graph.

Skovgard scratched his pencil's point into the top corners. He checked that the computer had properly barred the readings on the Y axis. Indeed. (The company knew what trouble it led to, especially concerning black market drugs, doses and overdoses, when employees knew exactly where their levels were at.) Finally, he had set it down in front of Ona.

"Ms. Ví, take a look at this chart, and tell me if it says what I think it does."

IC image

[DarknessDawning]

With the wave of his hand she stopped, standing stiff by the door way waiting for the printer to function. The sound of paper sliding through couldn't have come soon enough, and yet still as he snatched from the shute her innerds twisted and tightened... she wasn't supposed to see it. That in and if itself made her want to turn and vomit in the corner. Was she being let go? The panic that struck her was so intense that when he placed the paper on his desk for her to come take a look, it took her a moment to register what was happening. She felt dizzy, and stepped forward fully expecting to trip and crash to the floor in a thousand shards of broken glass. Luckily, her body ran on auto pilot and suddenly she was seated in a chair with her heart pounding in her ears, staring down at a white rectangle with colorful lines scrawled across it...

"It says... that my cortisone levels are up... and I exhibited a recent spike in norepinephrine. "

It was an odd feeling hearing her voice but not feeling like she'd said anything. Her cortisone levels? Was he going to fire her because she's stressed?

"Sir, if you'll give me a chance I'll go down to medical and get something to take care of it right away. I apologize profusely for the oversight. I'll make a note to be more aware of my personal status and take what measures are necessary to keep myself productive in my position. "

The words tasted like stomach acid and for a moment Ona could feel her hand start to shake. She quickly tucked it in her lap, wrapping her fingers together to hold them still.

[pugbutter]

"If you'd said your cephalochips are malfunctioning, I'd have taken your word for it. You've been only honest with us in the past," Skovgard said assuringly. By instinct he scratched at the squarish scars chiseled into his neckline. Four or five decades later the lines were still crisp like a new tattoo, and sometimes they still itched like one to have been reminded of. His slender hand then had moved to press down at the paper upon the desk, and slide it slowly back to his side of the desk, the authoritative side. He wanted to look at it again. But his was a gentle touch, and if she resisted, hoarding the chart to herself, then his finger slipped impotently off of it.

But besides that, he wore his dejection in his face. He didn't like throwing pills at his agents, wrapping their issues in bleached hospital sheets and drowning them in designer chemicals. That didn't tackle the sources of their problems; it was a bandage on a bullethole, granting only an illusion of remedy. No, she needed something more old-fashioned to soothe her frayed brains, digging right into the roots. The solution lied within her, somewhere, behind the makeup and the cutting-edge fashions in which she clothed herself.

"Ona,—if you'll let me call you that—I watched the readings in real-time while I had Mr. Elliott on the phone. You entered a fight-or-flight response when you received the news." He pointed at the spike in the orange line, thin and lean like a stiletto. "Of course being nervous was natural then. You probably thought you were in trouble. I hoped that once your body purged all the excess NA, things would go relatively back to normal, but as of fifteen minutes ago, your body is still spending progesterone to create cortisol. One is low and the other is much too high, you see. Stress—yes, you're very stressed. And I hope we can come to a solution for that problem together. Any ideas?"

He looked up at the clock; not very long after nine, and the chart only went to nine sharp. But he could assume rather reasonably that nothing had changed in that scarce interim. She realized that during this diatribe, his stiff fingers had steepled themselves, forming a sharp arch like a little belfry upon his desk.

[DarknessDawning]

She didn't try to keep the cart from him. Instead she sat there staring blankly at a spot in the table most likely having a silent panic attack right there in his office. Why hadn't she thought about blaming a malfunction? Perhaps today of all days Ona wasn't ready to be sharp on the dot with her reactions... perhaps she assumed he'd know she was lying anyways. Her imagined version of herself on this day was a complete train wreck barreling through. She wouldn't have believed herself if she were him.

Her eyes snapped up as he began explaining the chart and for a moment, her chest softened, allowing air to return to her lungs... that was only a chart of today... today. How silly she was that she'd forgotten to even look at the time line along the bottom. She'd readily assumed that it was a time line of the last month, or several months even... but no, it was today. The pressure lifted off of her so quickly that she became light headed. "My apologies sir, I misread the time line... of course I'm stressed this morning... we're conducting interviews today. I'm always anxious to ensure that I perform at my peak when the stakes are so high for the company. I want to make sure that we are only hiring the best of the best for our team here." A smile easily graced her lips as it wasn't even a lie. She was sure that if he pulled data of other interview days, she would show increases in stress levels then as well... maybe not as high as today seeing as how she'd had little to no sleep, and hadn't gotten the opportunity to properly prepare herself this morning, but increases. There was no reason for nit picking the difference between spikes was there?

"I assure you there's no problem. I'm quite fine to continue my work. I'll make sure I go to bed early tonight when I get home so that I'm refreshed and exhibiting normal levels in the morning." She hoped that it was enough to reassure him. After all, what did they expect? She suspected that if she went through those files, more than half of his staff was exhibiting stress considered above normal levels. That was life. Live it or die.

[pugbutter]

Just an hour, yes, but it was not a worthless glimpse at an anomaly; it was not too brief to form a pattern. Surely Skovgard had dug back through the records already. He'd seen the week and month-long crescendo her cortisol had built up, until her charts were a jagged cacophony jutting out at heaven like a fist fashioned into an obscene gesture. Surely that is why he glanced then and again at his screen, and even had the bravado, the sheer gall, to click about with his hand, that same vile hand which feigned at feebleness when the situation demanded that he seem gentle, kind, compassionate, and just a little senile.

"It's not a problem yet. I doubt your fertility levels are down. I doubt you'll have ulcers or a stroke by Christmastime! But the most dangerous problems are the ones which sneak up on us, Ona, inch by inch," he said. He kept clicking, no doubt between past charts and the current one, the one still scratching along, scribbling a memoir for the crimson line's ascent toward oblivion in the clouds. Then he clicked some more, between her hormonal charts and her work records, the times she clocked in (that day when she was three minutes late—vivisected like a butterfly, and pinned to cork for all to see!), her conversations with the cute guy from Purchasing, of course whose name and birthday and favorite brand of aftershave they already knew. God damn it, what was he looking at? Why, like a dentist, did he want to spend all day with those hooks and needles in his sinister hands, probing at every little wrinkle in the gums of her brain? He knew he should not be welcome there, not for minutes on end! Out! Out!

"I hope you'll take my advice and get away from work awhile. Working even harder, and visiting the medical ward for a vial of happy-pills—well, I think that would be ludicrous. Quite absurd." Why was it any of his business? "As far as I can see, the only vacation days you've taken this year were back in April, when you caught some kind of fever. You should have plenty left. Wouldn't this be much better? When I was a bodybuilder, they taught us that the rest days are when our muscles repair themselves. When they grow bigger, you know. If you'll pardon the analogy."

[DarknessDawning]

"I... uh" His commentary caught her quite by surprise. He was concerned about her fertility? About her development of ulcers or a stroke? She easily passed off the last two as an actual concern that she might miss work or need replacing altogether which would be very costly for the company. The first she couldn't make sense of though. "I don't ever plan on having children sir. That's not a concern of mine." She smiled awkwardly, hoping that the comment and the gesture settled some sort of concern in his mind. If he were really picking through every moment of her file he would notice for sure that she technically clocked in yesterday afternoon and had never clocked out, pouring in to the very moment that she was sitting before him now. "I'm quite alright really. I don't vacation really... I uhm... well I'm very dedicated to my work sir. Especially now when we have positions that need to be filled. I'm needed here, and I enjoy my job. I'm happy here I assure you."

She wasn't sure where he was going with all of this, but she had a building fear in her gut that he was going to force her to take vacation time. She had no idea what she would do with time off. She had nowhere to go, no one to see. The thought of sitting alone with herself for days on end was enough to make her consider begging to be medicated instead... though she hated the thought of meds too. Most of them included the potential side effect of "weight gain". She worked so hard to maintain her shape and still had pounds that she wanted to lose. She couldn't afford unnecessary weight from some anxiety medication. But if he required it of her, she supposed she would simply have to exercise more and eat less to accommodate it. She'd rather that that be sent home.

"Is there, anything else sir? I did leave my partner with the interviewees. It can be difficult to remember all of the files and conduct the interviews appropriately without the prompting of another to guide the questioning session as needed. I should really get back as soon as possible." She didn't want to rush him, but at the same time he seemed to be dilly dallying, and she didn't want to give him anymore time to consider or lecture her on her need for a vacation. She wanted to remind him she was needed here and now, and get out of his sight as soon as possible.

[pugbutter]

He watched her a long time, a very long time, without saying a word. Ona could not quite determine whether it was full-blown disbelief churning there behind his icy eyes, or mere skepticism; anger at having been lied to? Pity. Perhaps he was making up his mind himself on that matter, of how he wanted to feel in response to her words. He seemed cool about it, controlled; truly he had choice picks.

Finally something cracked in him, and he deigned to reply in words, recognizing, perhaps, that she would be no help in probing his brain, and helping him to sort and categorize the many things he thought and felt about this matter: "Well, let's not keep them waiting, then. You're excused, Ms. Ví. Health and happiness." Abruptly he was pretending she didn't exist; he turned his attention back the screen, and started clicking away, as if she'd evaporated, or had never existed at all, a mere phantom haunting the office.

He'd typed three letters—"E L L"— into a search directory. He scrolled through the jungle of Ellises and Ellingtons and Ellens. Finally he had navigated his way to the Elliotts. Dozens of them existed throughout the company's many branches, but very few were Elliotts, A.J.

Skovgard brought up the charts and he sighed. If only Alan's habits would rub off on his coworker! His vacations, while a bit frequent, were well-paced, to begin. What else did he do to keep his stress low and his productivity high, wondered the director? If he wasn't so quiet during breaks he could probably be persuaded to give a talk to the struggling employees.

When Ona had returned to the control room, Jewel was just screwing the cap back onto his flask, his chair pushed off against the wall where the cameras couldn't see. "Just finished the fourth one," he said. It was a lie, of course. He'd finished it ten minutes ago, and he was taking a micro-nap behind the anonymity of the one-way mirror. Ona had come back sooner than he expected, so although his hands were sluggish in returning the booze to the inside pocket of his windbreaker, with antithetical speed he kicked his wheeled chair back toward the dials and knobs of the control panels.

He didn't try to hide it from her anymore. He hadn't tried in months or years by then (they'd lost count). The hoard of breath mints in his desk betrayed him even when the stink of his sweat didn't.

[DarknessDawning]

Ona accepted her excusal with the same apathy with which he returned to his work. She nodded briefly and was up and out of his office before he'd gotten the chance to narrow the results to Elliot. With a decided stiffness, still rigid from her experience she passed the distracted desk clerk without bothering to acknowledge the airhead. She proceeded directly back to the interview room, as though even the smallest detour would set off another spike on her charts that would alert the bosses. In reality, her charts were probably spiking already as she tried to think of how to reverse an upward trend that the bosses saw as problematic.

When she entered, she was still in a bit of a trance that resulted in her scowl at Jules' bad habit being delayed. "If they're looking at me... they're probably looking at you too. Do you have to do that today?" She groaned, but let it go at that, proceeding to the stack of files to remind herself of who was next. The rest of the day was a blur. Ona conducted her duties like a programmed robot unable to disobey an order. During lunch, she remained in the observation room to "keep herself from getting distracted". Even Ona was allowed bad days now and then, but today seemed particularly difficult for her. Despite her issues, she pressed on without any further outbursts or issues. When the interviews were done and it was time to clock out, Ona was unusually prepared to leave. Rather than staying to re-organize the files or review the notes they'd made on each interviewee, she simply gathered her things and prepared to leave. She gave Jules a cordial farewell that was unbecoming to their usual closer relationship, and excused herself.

Once she was home, She stripped herself of her two day old clothing and makeup and stood in the steaming water of the shower for nearly an hour. Somewhere in the back of her head, her mind bothered her with the memory that she'd not eaten anything in two days now... and that this fact was considered unhealthy. Still, her stomach felt like a hole punched straight through her body, and she'd trained herself out of an appetite long ago. Instead of eating anything real, she settled for sipping at warm broth soup while reading the most recent fashion magazine she'd received, and putting herself to bed early. Tomorrow, she needed to exhibit lower levels of stress... the bosses demanded it.

[pugbutter]

Skovgard checked the charts one last time as he slung his coat, tailored immaculately, over his rigid shoulders. He was too late, of course; Ona had clocked out already, so the readings had all flatlined. He didn't have the warrants needed to check her levels when she wasn't at work, but still, he was tempted. He didn't override the system only because he knew it would come back to bite him later. He had people watching him, after all, just like she did.

Poor girl. He'd given her the chance to turn herself around, as she'd requested, rather than chasing the legal channels to force her into a psych's chair, or that of an aeroplane cabin heading to Dubai or Rio de Janeiro or the star-city. Now she had to make good on her promise. For her own sake.

---

---

"So what happened, Ona? You all right?" Jules asked. He wanted to know for his own sake, of course—whether directly, or in the form of his partner being taken away for other obligations around the company—but somehow it seemed impolite to mention that fact. Selfish. Anyway, she didn't answer, and that only meant it was something sensitive. He wondered, but didn't press her further. He was like that elsewhere, too: avoiding participating in cubicle gossip, but being unable to stop himself from eavesdropping, speculating.

Back to the grind. Soon enough he was home again, and this time, in the first night since he'd returned from his trip, he had the time and the energy about him to clean up a little. Food in the fridge which had gone rancid was discarded. The hoard of clothes atop the living room chair was divided, and sorted into neater places. The suitcase was half-unpacked, just to keep the shirts and slacks from getting attached to their wrinkles. The rest remained in that little pleather cocoon as distraction and diversion beckoned for Jules, who sat in front of his screens, and besides getting up for a drink or a bite of something cheap, salty, and instant, did not move til after midnight, when he knew it was time to get his six hours for another day at work.

Tedious. Monotonous. Well, at least it wasn't dangerous. Would it be worth getting out of this droning beehive if it meant having a point-one-percent chance every day of being in a tunnel collapse, or an oil spill, or any other workplace danger? Tucking himself in that night, like so many other nights, he dreamed of having the courage to tell these people where to stuff it. He imagined being a globetrotter and a philanthropist, having just enough money to never worry about food and shelter, but not enough to allure him to one place for long. In this fantasy world he needed no one but himself, answering to no paycheck but his own. And when he woke up he couldn't remember what he'd dreamed about; neither in sleep nor in the restless turning before.