On the fifth floor of a looming skyscraper in the central city district., a woman strode down the aisles between cubicles. She was clutching a large slab of paperwork to her chest, the papers rubbing somewhat noisily against one another. The monotonous standard-issue desks and chairs flew by as she approached her destination.
“Carlos?” she practically yelled throughout the space. “How could you have run off when I need you most? And how come I can’t find you when you’re ten-fucking-feet tall? Stand up so I can see you over all of these walls!” A moment later, a skeletal man with short black hair stood up. The reason Mary yelled for the man to stand was that, as she had pointed out, his height made him tower above the rows of beige partitions.
He wasn’t quite ten feet tall, closer to seven if just a bit under. Either way, his pale skin and bright eyes were beacon for the woman. He was undeniably large, but he looked absolutely massive when compared to the 158cm woman. Somehow, though, he seemed to shrink to a miniscule size when the imposing woman marched over to him. He took a sheepish step out of his workspace to meet his supervisor.
“Good morning, Mrs. Farris. Did you sleep well last night?” The woman halted her momentum and frowned upward at the towering man.
“As a matter of fact, I did not, not that it is not any of your business what I do in my free time, Mr. Lowell. Walk with me, we have places to be.” Carlos Lowell then began to follow slowly behind her, one of his strides the equal of three of Mary’s.
Things were always busy at Bastion Group’s headquarters, but one could tell at a glance that this week had been especially hectic. The pair went down various walkways, dodging employees, interns, and janitors along the way. Carlos found it hard to breathe, as he was constantly compressing his large frame to squeeze between the gaps in coworkers. Mary took the commotion in stride, clearing her breath to speak at Carlos without so much as turning her head.
“Did the event coordinators ever get back to us on which caterers they chose? Whoever it is, make sure they have plenty of vegetarian options for our guests.” He took a second to check his interface before answering.
“Our new intern Brandon chose B&R on 13th Avenue. It’s that deli-café hybrid place down the road.” She continued to fly down the hallways, her heels drumming a rhythm on the floor tiles.
“That’s good, they have strong coffee. Have that Brad you mentioned go grab some for me before we head out to the venue” Carlos nodded and added it to his growing list of responsibilities.
“Have you seen Robert anywhere lately?” Mary asked, still looking straight ahead. Carlos shook his head, some hair falling over his eyes.
“I heard he got called to go supervise a monitoring division exercise, so he’s been gone since yesterday.” If looks could kill, Mary’s would’ve already done it and hid the bodies while it was at it.
She scowled, “Tch, it’s so like him to avoid doing his damn job. We need to take him off salary and put him on hourly. It would probably save us a couple thousand dollars on the budget.” She scowled when she thought of the obscene amount he got paid annually.
“Carlos, what was the name of that girl who has been reporting to him? Denisse? Dolores?” The tapping of her heels on the floor grew louder and more pronounced, as if hurrying the man’s answer.
Carlos responded immediately, “I, uh, think it’s that new girl, Susan, the brunette with the blue eyes and-” Mary didn’t let him finish.
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“Get her on the phone and have her take on his responsibilities for the day. I’ve got a briefing with the Altum ambassador in ten minutes and Robert was supposed to be updating them on event security.” She rounded a corner and shoved the double doors into the stairwell open, blasting them to each side before marching in.
Carlos frowned. “I don’t like how much we’re having to spend on security. It really just seems like a waste of our budget and manpower.” Mary finally looked his way, her gaze once again causing him to shrink his enormous stature.
Surprisingly, she was not patronizing when she said, “You can’t think of it that simply, Mr. Lowell. You have to read between the lines when it comes to sensitive stuff like this. All of this may seem excessive, but you have to be careful when dealing with powerful It’d be good for you to remember who we’re dealing with here.”
Normally, Mary would’ve scalped an employee like Carlos for asking an intern-level question this far into his career, but he wasn’t off base with his comment. In actuality, it was even a fair point. Bastion didn’t want to book half of the security they ended up hiring for the event. It was just a banquet, after all.
“If you want to complain about the budget stretch, Lowell, go yell at that damn Humanity Ambassador. That guy has a stick so far up his ass he gets splinters on his tongue.”
Regardless of how annoying that guy was, Mary couldn’t dwell on the little things. For their company to be invited to the seventy-fifth anniversary of the Union was a huge opportunity in and of itself. The fact that they were hosting meant she wasn’t going to allow any big mistakes. No, she decided that nothing could go wrong at all.
Carlos began to breathe heavily, his size a detriment in cardiovascular activities. Mary ignored him and continued walking up the multiple flights up to the boardroom. It was a bit annoying how only company executives were allowed to use the elevator, which meant that the dregs of the organization, which even included Mary, had to go up the stairs.
Mary looked to the man and gave him a surprisingly genuine smile, “Stay strong Mr. Lowell. We’re expecting a lot from you, and this is hardly the worst we have planned for today.” Mary noticed what expression she was making, and her smile dropped. She had noticed how her honest smile warped into a warped facsimile that held more hostility than mirth.
She spent a lot of her life wearing fake smiles. It was a survival mechanism for people like her to smile for no reason. Smiling put people at ease and made them like you more, and it was very important that people liked Mary. She had heard that simply the act of smiling was known to increase your mood. Smiling seemed rarely made Mary happy, though. Now that she thought about it, smiling seemed to remind her more of stress than relaxation. Carlos watched all of this, but simply averted his eyes and kept walking up the stairs.
On the second floor before the top, a petite woman with a curly blonde bun in her hair rounded the corner above them. Her bright blue orbs caught the two officials ascending the stairs and she stopped, fear growing to consume her expression.
“Oh no, please tell me that isn’t who I think it is.” She hurriedly began to go back in the direction she came from when a voice echoed up the hollow stairwell, “Sally! How fortunate of you to join us. Wait just a second while we catch up.” Mary was suddenly in a poor mood, but she didn’t know why. Maybe teasing the interns would make her feel better.
“Sally, Robert bailed on his assignment and you’re the one who’s been reporting to him. Scan these notes and prepare to present them to the ambassador.” The small woman slumped her shoulders and waited for Mary and Carlos to catch up to her location.
“Mrs. Farris?” she tried as the woman passed by her, “My name isn’t Sally, it’s Susan.” Mary completely ignored her as she passed. Carlos looked at the small woman and smiled somberly as he handed her to document but was ignored in much the same way. Susan dejectedly took the stapled papers and began to look over them.
Mary got to the top of the stairs and sighed, releasing the breath she didn’t realize she had been holding. It was now or never. She straightened her collar, affixed a loose strand of hair to its proper place, and readied herself. Today was going to be hell, but she’d dealt with worse. This was just another meeting, a meeting she was going to make perfect.
The two employees she dragged along did not share her composure, worry plain on their faces. Mary had been in their shoes years ago and knew that this kind of high-stakes environment was what these newbies needed to truly become great.
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