“Ithirian limited is seeking men and women aged between 23 and 35 for work involving certain risks. Employment and accommodation provided outside of Australia, relocation to Canada is provided. Sponsored working visa on arrival in Canada. Salary starts at C$7000 per month. For more details, call now.”
Alex had just graduated from the University of Technology Sydney, eager to find a foothold in the competitive IT sector. Job prospects were tough; if you found work in your field, you were lucky. If not, you'd end up struggling in low-paying, temporary jobs. Junior Software Engineers weren’t exactly in demand, and the salaries offered were barely livable. Forget about affordable housing—the economy was in a state of constant flux.
After barely scraping through his final exam, Alex and his friends—also fresh graduates—celebrated for an entire week. The formal graduation ceremony, where they were handed their diplomas and pins marking their achievement, passed by in a half-drunken haze. It wasn’t that Alex had chosen the wrong field—he loved coding, problem-solving, and the idea of contributing to the tech world. But the economic landscape had shifted drastically. The rise of AI had slashed the demand for traditional software engineers, with many companies now opting for automated solutions that could code faster and cheaper. Sydney, once a beacon of tech innovation in Australia, was now crumbling under the weight of skyrocketing living costs and corporate greed.
Alex sat in his cramped room in a shared house, scrolling through jobseek.com.au, lazily skimming through overseas opportunities. His mind was foggy, still recovering from the previous night’s binge. He vaguely recalled his roommate, Tom, leaving something helpful for his hangover. Alex strained to remember where Tom had stashed it, but his memory was blurry—flashes of the past two or three days surfaced, but everything from yesterday was a complete blank.
The silence of the morning was shattered by loud voices in the hallway. Someone kicked the door, sending a cloud of plaster dust into the room. The door barely held on its hinges. Tom and Dave walked in.
"Hey, Alex," Tom said with a crooked grin. "Are you alive?"
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Alex attempted to nod, but a pounding headache stopped him in his tracks.
"Just about," Tom chuckled, digging through the closet. "Found it! And hey, there’s still half a bottle left."
He held up a half-empty bottle of vodka, grinning. "It’s not much, but it’ll do. Grab a seat, Dave."
Dave, their quiet housemate from Asia, scanned the cluttered room before pulling up the only intact chair and sitting down, his large frame blocking the doorway.
"Close the door, will ya?" Alex muttered, massaging his temples.
"No need. Mike and Paul will be here any minute," Tom replied as he poured the last of the vodka into three cups. "Do you even remember what we agreed on last night?"
"Vaguely…" Alex muttered, clearing a spot at the table by pushing an ashtray full of cigarette butts onto the floor. He took his seat and grabbed his drink.
"Alright, bottoms up," Tom said, and the three of them downed the vodka in one go. The harsh liquor burned its way down Alex’s throat, leaving a bitter taste that matched his mood.
"How do people drink this stuff?" Tom complained, rummaging through the fridge for leftovers.
"There’s some pasta in there," Alex suggested half-heartedly. He didn’t want to drink more, but the thought of enduring a hangover all day seemed worse.
"Perfect. We’ll make do with that," Tom said, quickly boiling some water. "Mike promised to bring over some canned meat."
Just then, more voices echoed from the hallway. Mike and Paul, their rowdy friends from the computer science department, barged in, nudging Dave aside. Mike, ever the loud one, carried a plastic bag brimming with cheap booze.
The day was shaping up to be as chaotic as Alex expected.
After some banter, a few more rounds of drinks, and a hastily thrown-together meal of pasta and canned meat, the group began to pack up.
"Ready to go?" Tom asked, yanking out a tattered suitcase from under Alex’s bed and tossing in some random essentials.
"Go where?" Alex asked, confused.
"To the airport, mate," Tom replied with a mischievous grin. "You’re already packed—you just don’t remember."