Day 5
Friday, June 10, 2045
Kaden looked up at the enormous hourglass logo on the side of the Tower. Dark thoughts weighed in the back of his mind as the bright morning sun slanted across the landscaped grounds. Secrets hid behind that logo, secrets that he would uncover.
He hurried into the building, sweating in the heat of summer in the City.. It was already over 90 degrees and not even 9am in the morning.
Unfortunately, the temperature inside the lobby was just as hot..
“What’s going on with the AC?” Kaden asked Cliff as he approached the front desk.
Cliff shrugged. “I don’t know. I just work here, man.”
Kaden spotted Sandy behind the desk, sprawled out on the marble floor and panting. And there it was, a message popping up on his glasses from his favorite criminally-inclined Corgi.
Balls! It’s hot in here.
Kaden watched Sandy roll over, tongue lolling out of his mouth as he panted.
Hey kid. Don’t look at me like that. The marble still has some coolness to it. If you’re smart, you’ll soon be down here too.
“Um, okay Sandy. Thanks I guess. I’ll keep that in mind. I guess it is pretty warm in the lobby.”
Sandy raised his head and fixed Kaden with a one-eye stare, tongue-lolling out of his mouth.
A little warm?! Are you kidding me? It’s hotter than a witch’s snatch in here. If those Facilities guys don’t get this fixed, I’ll have them shish-kabobed and roasted. I swear…
Sandy rolled over, kicking this legs to rotate his head back around to get an eye on Kaden.
But before you go – I got a job for you. Cliff has a package for you to take to Mark. And make it quick. He’s expecting it before 9am.
Kaden glanced at the time. “Ok… but that will make me late.”
Not my problem… but the more you sit around wagging your jaw the later you’ll be.
Cliff handed Kaden a small cardboard box.
“Right, thanks,” Kaden said and hurried through security.
As he made his way to Mark’s office, he realized he hadn’t brought the special counterward. He gritted his teeth and sped up. He was going to be late anyway. Best to get this over with as quickly as possible.
Thankfully, Kaden caught Mark just as he was arriving at his office.
“Excuse me, Mark – Here’s a package from Sandy,” Kaden said as he hustled up to the office. Sweat trickled down his face. It was really hot on this floor too.
Mark looked up as Kaden handed him the package.
“Ah yes. The Mailroom intern. Kaden, right?”
“That’s right,” Kaden said. “Are you familiar with the intern program?”
“Ha! Familiar? I used to run it.”
“Wow, okay. Any advice on how to survive it?”
Mark raised a critical eye.
“Who’s running it this year?”
“Alexander Wolfe and Carol Roche.”
Mark nodded, thoughtful. “So definitely no training wheels. Wolfe will throw you all into the deep end to see who survives… and Roche is as competent as an empty shirt.
“What’s your current rank?”
“Uh… well, I’m currently ranked last.”
“Ha! Truly SOL. Oh well. But hey, since you’re here, you could try to find an internal transfer. If someone’s hiring, that is. You might be able to transition out of the intern program before they show you the door.”
“That’s possible? I mean, I didn’t think that was a possibility.”
“Anything’s possible. With the right leverage,” Mark winked and smiled briefly. “Good luck,” he said and turned to go.
“Is your department hiring by chance?” Kaden asked quickly.
Mark turned back. “Ha! No, but good instincts. Remind me – there’s a few other interns in the purchasing department at the moment, right?”
Kaden nodded.
“What do you think of them?”
Kaden was surprised by the question, but he didn’t delay in answering. With Mark, quick and straightforward seemed best.
“Jill is on my team. She seems smart and capable in analysis, but she caves into pressure too easily. Iqbal and Roger… I don’t have much to say about them. My only interaction was less than positive.”
“Right,” Mark said. “Here’s what I’ll do. I could use another Plus program for this quarter… and your situation intrigues me. Consider me a mentor for your team.”
Mark smiled. “I’d also like to watch how Wolfe runs the program a little more closely… and ‘help’ out if I can.”
Kaden didn’t know the history between Mark and Alexander Wolfe, but clearly there was little love lost.
“Keep up your work with Sandy, and schedule some time with me and your team early next week. Sound good?”
“Absolutely, thank you!” Kaden replied.
Kaden hurried back downstairs. He arrived at the Mailroom at 9:10. Julia wasn’t there, but Peter was almost done sorting all the mail. There were only two boxes left.
“Good morning, sleepy head. Or did you miss the bus?” Peter asked with a smile.
Kaden just shook his head. “Sorry I’m late. I can finish up the sorting.”
“Sounds good to me,” Peter said, pushing the remaining two boxes across the table in Kaden’s direction.
“Peter – I had a question about the glasses. I had an issue with them yesterday. I was hoping you could help me understand what happened.”
Peter frowned. “What kind of issue?”
Kaden described what had happened in the gunsword training and how Alexander had implied that someone had interfered with the automatic sights that should have appeared on the glasses’ heads-up display. As he talked, Peter gestured for him to hand over the glasses which he did.
Looking back and forth between the glasses and his mobile, Peter poked around a few things while Kaden waited.
“So nothing seems wrong with the specs… Do something for me – check your settings on your mobile for the specs’ HUD and show me what you have.”
Kaden found the settings and showed him.
“See?” Peter said, pointing to the top of the list. “It’s turned off. Did you do that?”
He shook his head. “No! I didn’t even know this setting existed.”
“Well there’s nothing wrong with the glasses. Turn that setting back on and it should work just fine. Did you let anyone borrow your mobile or give them access to your Company account?”
“No, never.”
“Well I suppose it’s possible someone hacked your account. Typically your access is via various biosignatures, but they might have been able to get in with your passcode and some social engineering.”
Kaden was thunderstruck. He couldn’t think of anyone who could have hacked his account, nor why they would have done so.
Kaden suddenly thought of something. The passcode… Actually, maybe there was someone who could have done this.
“You good?” Peter asked.
Kaden looked up. “Yeah, thanks, appreciate the help.”
“Alright,” Peter said, grabbing a handful of packages and heading out the door. “Have a good weekend if I don’t see you!”
Kaden waved absentmindedly, lost in thought. He was pretty sure he knew who had messed with the settings on his mobile. It also made him wonder what other settings might be off. He made a note to go through them extensively before the afternoon training sessions.
Kaden shook his head and got back to work. If he was right and he knew who the hacker was, he had a plan on how to deal with them.
Before he knew it, it was noon and time for lunch with his team. They had agreed to meet ahead of their training this afternoon to discuss and strategize. Bill also wanted to continue brainstorming new names.
Kaden could hear Jill’s exasperated voice as he approached their table.
“No, Bill. I swear, over my dead body. Another rock reference and I will kill you.”
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“Kill Bill!” Kaden said, sitting down. “How about ‘Team Kill Bill?’”
“Like, as a reference to the films? I could dig that,” Bill said.
Jill looked crossly at Bill. “I’m done with it. That’s fine. Classic cinema is good enough for me.” She harrumphed and went back to her french fries.
“Okay then,” Kaden said. “Glad we can move forward now. Do you guys know anything about the training sessions this afternoon?”
No one really knew any details. The first session was with a large group similar to the first session. Carol was scheduled to teach them about collectors. Jill seemed excited for that one.
Immediately after, their team was scheduled in the same room for their Initial Team Assessment. Again, no one knew any details, but best guess was that it was another pass/fail exercise.
Kaden took a few minutes to go through all the settings on his mobile, and he quizzed Jill and Bill about their own settings to make sure his configurations were all standard. He didn’t find any other anomalies, but he did find a lot more potential adjustments than he had expected. The Company equipment allowed for significant customizability, if you knew what you were doing.
After they finished eating, they went up to the gym as a group and waited until their instructor arrived.
The leaderboard now read “Team Kill Bill” at the bottom of the board. Jill huffed when she saw it and stomped into the room. Bill posed for a selfie in front of it, tongue sticking out and rock hands raised.
As more people made their way into the large training room, Kaden thought there was no way this session could be worse than the first… but he should not have been surprised. After all, the instructor was Carol Roche, HR Specialist, who excelled at removing all interest from any and all topics. If anything, Carol was marvelously consistent. Another meeting that could have been an email…
He noticed Jill furiously taking notes. At least I’ll know who to ask about this topic if I have any questions, he thought.
Near as Kaden could tell, mana collection was dreadfully simple.
Of course there had to be nuances to specific situations, but the long and short of it was point, shoot, and watch your capacitors fill up with mana. Easy peasy. All you had to do was make sure the aural affinity of the capacitor matched the type of mana aura coming off the monster. The training made it sound simple, so Kaden didn’t worry about it.
At the end of class, every intern received a small metallic disk with a carabiner key ring. One side of the disk had a glossy grid pattern. Kaden attached it to his badge lanyard. Bill stuck it on his belt. Jill held hers in both hands for a long moment, looking at with such obviously intense delight that Kaden thought she might kneel down and worship the thing.
“This… this is so amazing,” Jill said softly to herself. She removed the carabiner and carefully inserted the disk into a leather bangle on her wrist.
Kaden got up to stretch his legs a little bit, but he and his team stayed in the room as the others left. For this next session, it was just “Team Kill Bill” in attendance.
A young man entered the gym and walked towards the three of them.
“Hey y’all. Glad to see you’re here on time.” He twirled his lanyard around his fingers as he made his way across the gym.
“My name is Andy Smith,” he continued in a slight Southern drawl. “I’m an Associate here at the Company. My side hustle this summer is babysitting teams of you interns as you figure out how to kill each other in the training gyms.”
The guy looked really young to Kaden, who thought he couldn’t have been any older than himself.
Andy had a short crew cut, brown hair, brown eyes, and was a little shorter than Kaden. He wore a black and white tracksuit, with squeaky white tennis shoes that were unnaturally bright.
“Think of me less like a teacher and more like a lifeguard,” Andy continued. “I have two goals: 1) Weed out the truly pathetic who might be a danger to themselves or others, and 2) Make sure most of you survive your time in the gym.”
Most of us? That’s … not so good. But strangely consistent with yesterday’s weapons training!
“Today’s your chance to complete the initial Team Assessment. You will face three low-level monsters. Your job is to confront the monsters, take control of the situation, and harvest enough mana to fill at least two standard small caps,” Andy said, holding up two fingers. “Any decent analyst or associate at the Company would be able to get up to four caps from these creatures, so it shouldn’t be a problem for three of you together. Are you with me so far?” Andy mimed nodding his head. The group nodded their heads in return.
“Ok! I’ll be sitting over there. I’m not going to intervene unless it looks like one of you might die… Oh, and technically there’s no time limit, but honestly it shouldn’t take more than a couple minutes.
“Any questions?”
Kaden looked at Bill and Jill. Seemed pretty straightforward. Kaden felt excited and a little nervous.
“What kind of monsters?” Kaden asked.
Andy smiled. “That’s a surprise – you’ll see ‘em in just a sec.”
With that, Andy walked back to a chair by door, spinning his lanyard as he went. After sitting down, Andy took out his mobile and entered a command.
Three monsters materialized in front of the group. At first glance, they looked a lot like chickens: two legs, two wings, red and white feathered body, and a small pointy head with two beady eyes and a yellow beak. On closer inspection, however, Kaden noticed some monstrous abnormalities: instead of tail feathers, scaly snake-like appendages floated behind each creature. And instead of soft combs on top of their heads, razor-sharp spikes stuck out at odd angles. These monsters were also bigger than your average chicken, almost as big as a turkey.
Kaden quickly checked a notification:
* Chickenator
* Level 2
* Attacks: Physical (pecks, head strikes, razor talons) and sound (mana-based blast attack)
* Aural affinity: Variable
The monsters started squawking and pacing around. Kaden took a moment to look over at Bill and Jill. Bill was trying to fish something out of his pocket and Jill was intensely studying her HUD.
“Hey guys, any reading on the aural affinity for these guys?” Kaden asked.
Before anyone could respond, one of the creatures scurried forward towards Kaden. The creature lunged for Kaden, its legs and razor-sharp talons extended. Kaden jumped back, surprised. He lashed out with his mana sword, which he had primed and ready to go with his backup power supply.
Kaden’s hurried strike connected, separating the monster’s head from its body. Viscous blood continued to pump out of the neck, spraying the room with a dark, purple ichor as the body continued running. Kaden watched in horror as the body kept going past him until veered into a wall, where its limbs gradually shuddered to a halt.
“Oops,” he muttered, as the chickenator’s body dissolved into mana that quickly dispersed through the room. That sucks! I didn’t harvest any of its mana, Kaden chided himself.
Meanwhile, Bill had a handful of peanut-butter dog treats in his hand, extended out to one of the monsters. It approached cautiously, moving its head back and forth, eyeing the treats in his hand suspiciously.
“Here birdy birdy,” Bill called soothingly. “Stay right here while we drain your mana. That’s it, hold still,” he said, reaching for the collector disk on his belt.
“Bill!” Jill shrieked. “That’s not going to work!”
Before he could do anything, however, the chickenator caught the scent of blood in the air and attacked immediately. Opening its beak, a pale blue orb appeared, gathering strength. The chickenator released it, and a shockwave of sound pulsed outward.
Bill flew backward, landing awkwardly and sliding toward the back of the room.
“Bill!” Kaden cried. “Are you okay?” Bill struggled to stand on his feet.
Kaden froze, not sure what to do. Should he run to Bill and try to help him? Should he stay here and try to help Jill with the remaining two monsters?
“Kaden! I’m almost ready,” Jill said. “I need just another minute. Can you help distract the monsters for me?”
Kaden unfroze and started walking warily towards the two remaining chickenators. Both were now squawking loudly and circling the space around Jill, trying to assess if she was a threat.
Kaden tried to think of an effective distraction. He didn’t want to kill them outright, because that would negate the purpose of the exercise. He needed to give Jill the time she needed if they were going to have any chance of passing this assignment.
So Kaden did the first thing that came into his mind.
“Hey!” he yelled at the chickens. “Over here!”
The monsters paused and turned toward him.
“That’s right – Over here. I just killed your friend. How do you feel about that?”
The chickenators appeared to be listening, so Kaden kept going.
“Wanna piece of me? Or are you too scared?” Kaden feinted a lunge at the monsters, who jumped back defensively.
“Yeah, I see how it is. Scaredy cats. Chickenshit chickenators. Come and get me,” And with that, Kaden turned his back on the monsters.
Kaden waited a moment, listening, waiting to see if they fell for his ruse. He activated his gravity counterward in anticipation.
The scratch of talons on concrete confirmed it. The monsters jumped to attack him.
So Kaden ran. As fast as he could, away from Jill and Bill, he led the two chickenators on a chase around the far side of the gym. The antigrav counterward gave each stride extra power, and he flew across the room.
The monsters were fast enough to keep up, but they were clearly unfamiliar with the jukes and jives of basic schoolyard tag. Kaden kept them busy for a full thirty seconds, sprinting, dodging, and pivoting rapidly to keep their flashing beaks, combs and talons away from him. He also kept an eye towards Jill, waiting for her signal.
Bill was back on his feet and standing with Jill when she started waving frantically. Catching the signal, Kaden sprinted back towards his teammates.
“Get down!” Jill shouted, motioning her hands downward.
Kaden went into a slide, turning on his side and coming back up next to Jill. As he turned to face the chickenators, he saw both monsters open their beaks wide and release a combined sound blast.
The mana-powered sound attack flew towards the group but did not strike them. Kaden glanced over to see Bill, hand outstretched, sound dampening ward in his hand and activated. The mana energy of the attack crackled blue over Bill’s ward, and gradually filtered down into the collector Jill was holding.
The chickenators kept attacking, but the ward held. Jill filled up two and half capacitors before the chickenators showed signs of flagging.
All of a sudden, one of the chickenators flopped over, out of energy. It immediately expired, dissolving into a pool of rapidly dissipating mana. The last chickenator followed suit shortly after that, having exhausted the mana reserves that kept it corporeal.
Those have to be the stupidest monsters ever, Kaden thought.
Still out of breath and panting, he sank to the ground. “Thanks Jill,” he said between deep breaths. “You saved us.”
Jill pushed glasses back up and tucked her bangs back behind her ears. “Well. All’s well that ends well, I suppose. It took me a minute to calibrate the mana capacitors to absorb the mixed auras from those monsters. We were not well prepared,” she said. “But Jesus Bill, you nearly died. Pull something like that again and I will kill you myself.”
Bill looked up sheepishly. “Hey you know, I gotta soft spot for farm animals. Thought I could distract them long enough to get the mana collection feed going, you know?”
Jill rolled her eyes. “At least you didn’t kill them outright like Kaden did. That was a disaster.”
Kaden felt a little upset at Jill’s comment, but he knew she was right. He had put the whole team in jeopardy with his mistake.
A slow clap sounded across the room.
“What a show… that was… something else. I gotta say, quite the goat rope,” Andy drawled. “I’ve seen a lot in this training room, but nothing quite like that.”
An awkward silence hung in the room. Jill looked down at her feet. Kaden, however, looked Andy in the eye.
“We passed, though, right?”
Andy grudgingly nodded his head. “Yep, I s’pose you did. You did meet the session’s minimum objectives with at least two mana capacitors filled up, so good on you there. But I wouldn’t be expecting any high scores. Y’all are just…” Andy shook his head.
“A bit of free advice … y’all should think about how you want to work as a team. And each of you have some major developmental areas that need some work – you might do well to shore up your individual weaknesses.”
With that, Andy turned and exited the room.
Kaden sighed. At least they had passed. Clearly they had a lot to work on, but at least they passed.
A system notification blinked on the periphery of Kaden’s vision. Kaden pulled up two notifications:
Congrats! You have passed your first Team Assessment. You’re now granted access to schedule and use Company gyms for team practice. Please reach out to your manager or team coach with any questions!
Congrats! The Company recognizes your skill in verbal combat. New skill unlocked: Trash Talking, Level 1. Keep up the hard work!
He rolled eyes. It could have been worse; at least no one else was watching. Or so he thought.