Rosalind roamed through her memories - now featuring 100% more Jasper! - as vignettes of her shared moments with Aziz flashed through her imagination.
Holding hands in the company kitchen, as Aziz prepared tea while Rosalind concocted the strongest coffee known to man. Aziz sleeping on one side of the bed while Rosalind, sitting upright against the bedpost, typed away at the tiny laptop perched on her thighs. A quick, chaotic round of foosball made ever more colorful by the fact that neither of them had any idea what they were doing. Aziz stopping by the office late at night to drop takeout shawarma off at her desk during the final legs of a project sprint she was leading.
“I know how the old expression goes - don’t shit where you eat. But somehow, we were able to make it work.”
Eating lunch together on a bench at the park. Cute post-it notes on each other’s desks (I really like you) amidst a sea of stickies detailing action items, reminders, and feedback. Being each other’s excuses to stand in the corner of the room during company events.
The sea of flashbacks solidified into a final singular moment. On a break from their desks, Rosalind and Aziz sat shoulder to shoulder on the couch in the shoddy-looking company lounge area, laptops in laps, heads resting against each other as they worked.
“Things were quaint. Cozy. Consistent. Just the way you’d want good things to stay. But then, the company started becoming, well, the company.”
A dozen or so meters from the couch stood Martin, frozen in place, mouth agape, transfixed by something on his phone. Employees noticed his shocked expression and shouted across the floor, asking if something in the codebase had broken. No response.
Slowly, they rose from their desks to approach him near the whiteboard. The growing commotion eventually reached Rosalind and Aziz at the couch, who stood up to see what was going on.
The gathered crowd, containing at least a few people who were growing tempted to grab Martin’s phone for a quick peek, were put at ease as he squeaked out a few words to pierce the tension.
“Article in QuantTech Review… about us… glowingly positive.”
Like the moment after a corkscrew pops the top of a champagne bottle, Rosalind, from her vantage point, felt the two seconds of vacuum before the celebration filled the room. Before everything changed.
Amidst the cheers and fist-pumping as everyone got up from their desks, the sound of Martin shouting “They love us!” echoed in Rosalind’s mind as the vision shifted yet again, morphing and twisting, until she reached a familiar sight.
She was back to the pair of tables pushed together at XPeriential, her and Aziz again sitting across from each other. This time, both were plugged in, blank expressions on their faces. Not a chance of a stolen glance between these two.
Jasper, once again intruding into the mind palace, held onto a rope hanging from the ceiling in the room, chiming, “I suppose we’re having a little trouble in paradise?”
“It’s not that straightforward,” Rosalind said, assuming herself in her own flashback, getting up from the desk, cutting Jasper’s rope with a large butcher knife materializing out of thin air, causing him to topple to the floor. “We liked each other. But we were in love with the work.”
The duo watched as the room morphed in a fast-forward time lapse, old machines being replaced with new models, tarnished furniture disappearing to make way for fancy installations, the staff headcount growing alongside the increasing amenities. A floor that became more and more suffocating as the amount of traffic in it increased.
And through it all, Aziz was glued to his monitor.
“Yeah. I think I remember,” Rosalind narrated.
This time, she couldn’t sit in the memories. She could only watch them from a distance. Like an old projector playing against an already busy wall in the company building, she squinted to watch the milestones and events that were a busy blur to her: Aziz and Rosalind sitting upright on opposite sides of the bed with headphones in and fingers typing away, Rosalind placing another post-it to Aziz’s desk about an unoptimized piece of code, no hand-holding with drink prep in the kitchen this time, just both of them doing calculations in their head. The kettle clicked - the water was boiled.
–
Rosalind opened her eyes. Noticing the lack of narration, Jasper opened his too. A pause. ‘That was the whole story?’ he thought to himself.
There was more, but Rosalind needed to gather herself. Something that had been buried in the back of her mind had now seemingly dislodged, and she couldn’t place how she felt about it.
“I can’t even remember how we actually broke up,” she said. A split-second of a moment flashed before her eyes, but she couldn’t grab hold of it fast enough. Was it just a brief, unemotional exchange on a park bench? A mutually detached, almost professional, conversation?
Jasper was curious too. “Really? No big romantic fallout? Both of you weren’t secretly having your own separate affairs with Willow, feeding her insatiable lust for all things sick and twisted like a couple of meat puppets?”
“What?”
“Nothing, please continue.”
Rosalind tried her best to recall her headspace from years past. “I-i think with the company’s new valuation, and, like, all of the money that was coming in, the opportunity to set ourselves up for life, opportunity to be a big part of what was looking to be century-defining technology… I think we just, like, came to terms with everything quietly. Family, friends, relationships, hobbies… all of those things needed to fall to the wayside for a while. The work had to come first.”
“And there was no bad blood,” said Jasper, stating it as half-question, half-fact.
“None. In terms of leftover romantic baggage, we were as peaceful as two exes could be. But… there was something. Not vengeful lover something. But work something.”
“Elaborate.”
–
Back in her mind’s eye, Rosalind stood facing a high-tech soft-drink machine in XPeriential’s vast all-hands area. Bright icons flashed on its screen, showcasing a variety of drinks to choose from. After some thought, she decided on a Pineapple Coconut Fizz. Instantly, the drink materialized out of thin air in an open area in the machine under the selection screen. Having seen this technological wonder countless times in the three years since UBE technology had upended the world, she grabbed her drink, stepped away from this very routine interaction, and made her way to the bigger crowd in the sprawling communal space.
On her way, she took in the familiar landmarks of the expensive loft area. There was a coffee bar, a beer tap section, lots of comfy couches, and floor cushions near a big screen that was broadcasting live. This was the real XPeriential company. Not a dingy open-space floor on top of an arcade, but the tech giant that was making waves week after week in the world. And standing at the very front of the stage, mid-presentation, was Martin.
Now comfortably settled amidst the crowd, she took a nervous gulp of her drink. Jasper materialized beside her in her live flashback-playback.
“Why do you look so nervous when this is your memory and you know exactly what happens?”
“Quiet,” replied Rosalind.
They listened to Martin’s presentation, which was filled with just the right amount of filler for a company event. The employees, dressed as if it were prom night, littered the loft area with eyes firmly fixed on the stage, all of them one-hundred percent invested. As Martin beamed, speaking about that year’s company achievements as the vast screen behind him seamlessly transitioned between visuals, Jasper’s “professor” side had to quell the growing jealousy it felt at Martin’s ability to successfully play to a captive audience.
Then, faster than she’d expected, the presentation segwayed to the moment Rosalind had been waiting for.
“And the employee of the year,” Martin started, “goes to… Rosalind Grey!”
Rosalind's eyes widened, eyebrows arching in sheer astonishment — an odd display given she was reliving a moment she'd experienced before. As her coworkers clapped around her, she handed her Pineapple Coconut Fizz drink to Jasper, who was confused on how the continuity of her drink even made flashback-sense. Thrilled to the bone but professionally composed, she walked up through the crowd and onto the stage, shaking Martin’s hand who then gave her a supportive shoulder-squeeze, approached the podium, and started her acceptance speech.
If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.
As she spoke, she couldn’t help but notice her well-dressed ex-boyfriend, the one with the break-up circumstances she could barely recall, who as it also turns out, had been in the running for employee of the year, staring up at her with an almost Mona Lisa-gaze of mixed emotions.
“I couldn’t make out what his expression was,” Rosalind narrated, looking down from the stage at Aziz in the crowd. “It was wistful, it was angry, it was knowing, it was frustrated. It was… jealous.”
–
Eyes open, back in the inn room, a 3D, present-moment Jasper was in her line of sight yet again.
“In that moment,” said Rosalind, “I realized that I wasn’t just some awkward work ex to him. I was something else. A rival.”
“A rival?” Jasper asked.
Rosalind, usually compelled to keep her mental math within her head, decided to work through her thoughts out loud for Jasper’s sake.
“It was a one-sided rivalry, obviously,” Rosalind clarified. “I mean, I was the golden child, Martin did love me and he made no secret of that to anybody. And, as much as I might make fun of him for his long-winded, pretentious, starry-eyed, techno-jargon and buzzword-filled monologues, he was the guy, and everyone I knew at XPeriential, myself included, on some level wanted his validation. And I was lucky enough to get it. And Aziz, for all of his hard work and killer contributions, wasn’t as lucky. And that might’ve been because, and I know this is gonna sound a little bit egotistical, but maybe… I was just better than him.”
Jasper took this in, somewhat impressed by Rosalind’s admission.
“Obviously, all of this just makes what happened before the launch even more confusing,” she said.
“Did something else happen before the launch?” Jasper asked.
“Oh!” said Rosalind, realizing that revealing details about her getting fired might serve to make this already intricate situation with Jasper even more tricky to maneuver, “Martin… confessed his romantic love to me before the launch! Crazy, right?” she covered, poorly.
“Really?” asked Jasper, surprised. “That seems awfully random, don’t you think?”
Rosalind’s face mimicked mock astonishment. “Right?! That’s totally what I thought too. He said, exact words, that he loves me as a friend, as an employee, and as a romantic prospect. And, just when you think that’s crazy, he also told me that he has a… phobia of… music!”
“You’re kidding?! That’s downright fascinating!”
“Right?! Super… like, bonkers. It’s a super rare condition. Forget the name. Probably best not to look it up… I promised him I’d never tell anyone about it, actually.”
“Scout’s honor,” said Jasper, incorrectly placing his hand on top of his head. “Bit of an odd duck for sure, but you know how these genius billionaire types are,” he continued. With that, Jasper approached the whiteboard, secured a pen, and circled Aziz’s photo on the board. Rosalind exhaled, relieved that her half-baked cover somehow worked.
“Now,” said Jasper, turning back, “I’m not saying this Aziz fella was the culprit. But, I do think it’s safe to say he is a suspect. Narratively - it checks out. Relationships are strange, they make us do strange things, and seeing someone you used to date take off on a rocket while you’re… I suppose, also on that rocket, albeit in lower standing, could make anyone go stir crazy. Plus, you mentioned he was a programmer, right?”
“Yeah, he’s a programmer.”
“Now, I don’t know how this interuniversal barcode –”
“Universal backend –”
“Right, I don’t know the ins and outs of how it works, but I’d assume that a strong programmer already working at the company could figure out a way to sabotage the launch? And in terms of motivations… maybe by doing it, he’d be sending a message to everyone who had deprived him of the praise and recognition he felt oh so entitled to.”
“Yeah…,” said Rosalind, nodding in agreement, with a touch of sadness at her suspicion being echoed by Jasper.
Her brief moment of wistfulness was interrupted by the sound of her watch beeping.
She glanced at the watch, registered something internally, and began to pack the whiteboard into the XPeriential Points game inventory.
“Wait, that’s it?! One suspect and you’re calling it? Hold on a second, I saw a lot of other faces on that board!” said Jasper.
“No, not calling it, we’ll pick this up again soon, very soon even. But Murphy’s gonna be at the ‘place where there is no darkness’ shortly, and we have to go meet him.”
“You mean to tell me you know where the ‘place where there is no darkness’ is?”
“Dude, I was a lead engineer on the game, remember?” said Rosalind, making her way to the door. “We’ll meet him soon, but first, we gotta get some freebies around town.”
–
Rose and Jasper exited the inn, starting on a path heading deeper into town. Up ahead in the distance, Jasper noticed someone walking ahead of them.
“That’s Jeff,” said Jasper, realizing, “I should really go and mock him some more for being forced into innkeeper duties -”
Rosalind held up a finger to Jasper’s mouth, shushing him.
“Let’s focus up. We’ve only got a small window to do everything right. We’re gonna hit up all of the loot locations in town that I found in Danny Doorstep’s code, and then, we’re gonna time our meeting with Murphy just right. If we do everything within the correct time frame, we increase our odds of getting a rare endgame weapon drop that’ll help us beat this game faster,” she said firmly.
“I’ll do my utter best to pretend I understood everything you just said,” he replied.
–
Jasper and Rosalind meandered through the town’s back alleyways, weaving behind some quaint houses. As she reached the predetermined spot she was heading for, Rosalind veered off the path, hopping into a backyard, and arriving at a shed, which she rummaged through for a bit before she came across a glowing treasure chest. She opened it up.
A chime effect played as she picked up:
Two Heirloom Feathers!
Haste Bracelet!
Adamantite Wand!
400 Silver!
“Nice!” Rosalind cheered to herself, equipping the bracelet and the wand in her menu.
“Shh, you’re trespassing!” said Jasper quietly, arriving late at the shed and struggling to keep up with Rosalind’s pace.
“Oh, we’re fine. Everyone in this house is an NPC.”
Rosalind stepped out of the shed and waved cheerfully towards a living room window that overlooked the yard. To Jasper’s surprise, NPCs inside responded with a synchronized wave.
With a confident stride, Rosalind hopped the fence and continued on her merry way. Jasper followed, briefly looking back at the still-waving NPCs.
“Creepy,” he murmured.
–
Rosalind and Jasper cautiously edged around a secluded nook, nestled high in the town on a hillside. In the center of this elevated area was a massive chair, on which a hulking knight cradling an oversized sword was in deep slumber.
“Is that another friendly NPC that we can wake up and wave to?” Jasper asked.
“Oh no, that’s Ozma the Destroyer - he’s actually a very overpowered optional boss who could kill us in one hit if he wanted to,” she replied.
“Wait, are you serious –”
Before he could finish, Jasper tripped on a loose stone, triggering a mini avalanche. Rosalind and Jasper stared in horror as Ozma started rising from his seat.
–
Inside a majestic town mansion, Rosalind and Jasper were in an ornate corner room. Rosalind tapped her magnetic XPeriential pen onto a safe that she was working on. Jasper stood beside her, shifting uneasily in the clothes that he’d tattered in their escape from Ozma’s wrath.
“Please tell me this is the last piece of loot, and that we aren’t going to go into the lair of some psychotic dragon next,” said Jasper.
Rosalind continued maneuvering the safe’s dial. “Aaaaaalmost there,” she said. And then, with a satisfying crack, the safe door opened, releasing with it a triumphant chime. Jasper winced at the piercing sound while Rosalind celebrated as they received:
Mythril Armor!
300 Silver!
Attack Pendant!
“Awesome, this is gonna be super useful,” Rosalind said. “Let’s roll.”
She strolled out of the room, keeping a brisk pace. As Jasper followed along, he walked past an NPC who was conveniently stationed by the door, smiling at them as they left.
“Seriously, you’re just going to let her rob you?” asked Jasper.
“I think what I love most about Alexandria, if I had to pick, is the delightful inn. There’s always something interesting happening in the dining hall there, that’s for sure!” the NPC responded.
“I don’t trust you,” said Jasper, exiting.
–
They stood at the entrance of a grand, weathered church.
Rosalind intently eyed her watch, while Jasper, puzzled by the evening’s routines, searched for words.
“You’re telling me we’re gonna rob a church now?!”
“Nope, we’re done with our looting,” said Rosalind. “It’s time for something different.”
Jasper understood. They stood in silence for a while.
“The place where there is no darkness,” said Jasper.
“That’s right,” she says. “It’s time to see Murphy again.”
Her watch beeped.