Episode 15

“You’ve got some nerve waltzing around here like you own the place. Flirting with our boss. Turning off our gear!”

Before Sharp stood a man named Syd. He had a flamboyant-magenta tuft of hair on his head valiantly defying male pattern baldness. It complimented his bloodshot eyes. The unpleasant man was right about one thing. Sharp had turned off their BBS. They had apparently been planning their next role playing campaign on the sly when Sharp rudely interrupted them.

Syd and Sharp were on a first name basis now that Syd introduced himself with a donut. The filling still dripped down Sharp’s front, staining his rumpled white pima cotton shirt irreversibly deep purple.

“Forget the BBS. You have a lot to answer for. While we watched our investments tank, you embezzled millions and flew off to Taiwan to romance some hot TickleTalk dancer.”

“Yeah!” added Syd’s friend, who took being a toady very seriously. “I mean, if it’s the girl I’m thinking of, she does these great dances to synthvoc tunes. I can see why you’d be, like, tempted, but not with our money!”

Sharp sidestepped the group of men who had begun to circle around him and walked over to a workstation. “This is yours, right?” Sharp said towards Syd.

“Yeah, that’s my station. What of it?”

“Good. I’ll just borrow this.” Sharp reached down and took a paper off the desk and used it to wipe up the jelly donut that was threatening to drip onto Syd’s desk. Glancing through his AR lenses, he instantly patched into Syd’s computer and had his AI begin configuring the workstation’s new network settings.

“Hey!”

“That’s our dungeon map,” said the toady. His voice trembled just a bit.

Sharp looked away from the computer towards them. “So, let me get this straight. I flew off to Taiwan while also remaining behind in Utah as I sold off all my assets to pay my business debts and legal costs? Did that girl dance on the ashes of my company?”

“Don’t get smart with us! What about how you sold your company secrets to your competitors and made bank!” shouted another lab worker who had joined the group.

Ignoring him, Sharp turned to a dark haired girl at the next workstation. She stepped back nervously at his approach. Sharp wasn’t surprised. He did tower over her. She barely came up to his chest. Sharp also noticed that her makeup was perfect, especially around her piercing brown eyes. Even he had to admit she was pretty. Unlike the others in the room, she hadn’t let her appearance get shabby. Yet because she regarded Sharp suspiciously, he didn’t bother being friendly with her.

“I need to configure your AR deck for the network. Excuse me…um, Apple.” There was a card of a cartoon hamster on her cubicle wall with that name. It was as good a name as any.

Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

“That’s not my name.”

Sharp patched into her workstation on his virtua display and let his AI call up her settings panel and fill out the network details.

“You made a deal with the Chinese to sell out our country,” interjected yet another angry technician from behind him.

Tilting his head back in the direction of his accuser, Sharp’s mouth stretched into a sardonic smirk, then replied, “The Chinese company that announced a new product built with my tech on the same day our VC angel called in his chips and Wudgepuck’s old company hit us with a tortious interference lawsuit? That Chinese company‽ I didn’t make bank. I got spanked!”

“Your hedge fund shorted the stocks and made a killing while our investments went up in smoke!” cried Syd.

“I never ran a hedge fund,” replied Sharp in monotone, losing interest again.

“Are you accessing my private files?” The girl stepped into Sharp’s space, looking at her AR screen in alarm.

Sharp gave her a look of incredulity. “You have no private files, Apple. Everything belongs to Bloop. Wudgepuck digs through everything.”

“That’s MISTER Wudgepuck, and my name’s not Apple! But never mind that. You aren’t even touching the mouse or keyboard,” she said as she looked up at him through her AR glasses.

“You dated a Nazi!,” one of the lab workers shouted out, but even his co-conspirators shook their heads at that one. Sharp didn’t bother replying and instead continued his train of thought.

“You do realize that Wudgepuck has a team that catalogues all employee data just in case somebody leaves Bloop to launch a company with an idea created on company time?” Sharp swapped screens to verify the AI’s work.

“You’re being paranoid,” she replied.

“Are you kidding me? He’s got lawyers and data analysts all lined up. It was the main reason the board overrode Novell and hired him.” Sharp stood back, then spoke out to nobody in particular. “All done. Just fifteen workstations left to configure.”

If they’ll let me.

“You…you took bribes from Russia to build a harem of slaves!”

Russia, too? They’ve pulled out all the boogeymen. Wait, a harem of slaves?!

Sharp began to laugh. “None of these stories are true! I lost my girl, my house, and my company all in one day. I moved my billions, which had suddenly lost 58% of its value, out of skllazon into Arbereom, and then the Arbereom foundation locked my wallet for ‘justice’. When the dust finally settled, I owned the government an enormous amount of capital transfer taxes, and I was living out of my car.”

“Don’t give us a sob story. What about your illegal farm of mining rigs?” asked the toady.

“Mining what? My coin, skllazon, was a dead coin by the end of that week. Everybody delisted it! And where would I set up a bank of rigs? Remember? I lived in my car.”

“Hey, guys,” said Kyle. “I can confirm that. I saw him sleeping in his car at Investment Park before he started working here.” Kyle caught Sharp’s eyes with a look of pained sympathy.

“Yeah, but his car is worth $250,000,” countered Syd.

“Right, but you don’t want to live in it!” said Sharp with a laugh. “It was my sole possession, aside from my phone plan, and I couldn’t bear to sell it.”

Sharp patched into the next station and let his AI get busy.

“You made secret versions of your AI neural netchips to syphon off millions from the company coffers!” offered another excitable lab worker.

“Cool idea! But it didn’t happen,” Sharp smiled, stepping away from the workstation. All that was left were thirteen workstations in the lab, and the gear in the WMD room. Then he could leave this place for good. His mood lifted just thinking about filing his two week notice.

“You ruined me!” shouted the toady

“You still haven’t answered my question!” said Apple.

“I’ll wipe that smile off your face, you jerk! I want my money back!” growled Syd as he reached for another donut.

“What on earth is going on in here‽”

At the door stood Isabelle with a phone to her ear with her eyes and mouth wide open.