Monday: 11.24am
Daniel decides to do the data entry.
You turn your computer on, and as it boots up you pick up the pile of questionnaires and position them close to hand on the left of your keyboard within easy reach for extra speedy uninterrupted entry. You double click on the AFRODITE database icon [4] on your depressingly messy desktop [1] and while it whirs into action you decide to pop on the small radio on the side of your desk.
Deathly passion, accordion plays!
The life force parts but the soul it stays!It sounds like one of Accidental Toilet’s deathfunk folkmetal b-sides, and as you start entering and tabbing your way through the two hundred and thirty two fields per questionnaire, your head and fingers fall easily into the infectious accordion driven rhythm
Staring in the distance, staring hard!
Deathly raucous but compassionate bard!Time flies past and so do the completed questionnaires; you wonder why you don’t have any of the new Accidental Toilet EP on your mp3 player. You’ve probably got another 45 minutes of this to go, at least. You glance up at the clock, wandering when you should go for lunch.
Morale Drop! Too many unfinished tasks on the desktop!
Morale Boost! Typing speed of deathfunk folkmetal! Raaaah!
Task Assigned! Data entry!
Failure Rating: 12.
Morale: -3.
Seeing that he had no particular task to do, he decided to make himself useful. Workers were heading back inside so Satoshi went in with them and headed to the lobby, where he replaced the bags in the trashcans and took the waste out to the dumpster in the back.
As various workers return to buildings that had been evacuated in error, you head out to the lobby and empty the trashcans, replacing the bags. You grab a half dozen bags of waste and put them over your shoulder to take out to the dumpster outside in the sun.
You swing the bags into the dumpster in one manly go, but one of them hits the edge and drops back down. You’re taking an extra big swing to make sure you get it in this time when, suddenly, the boss walks past from the other side of the dumpster.
ACCIDENTAL BOSSCHECK!“Hey Satoshi, I’ve got a quick job for yo…
Just as you get three quarters of the way into your bag swing, the bag splits [1]! The bag explodes in the air, the waste impacting hard in the bosses face!
“Satoshi! WHAT THE HELL? What do you think you’re doi… OH GOD IS THAT PIGEON ON ME?”
You notice pigeon feathers seem to be stuck to the boss’s suit, along with banana skins and damp tissues and the like. Ooh, and is that a pigeon foot sticking out of his pocket?
“I’m sorry sir, that could happen any time with the cheap bags the head of maintenance insists on getting for us, I’ve told him more than once,” you calmly point out [6]. “What were you doing behind the dumpster anyway? Is there more fire sir? Should we evacuate?”
“I… er… no. Get all this round here cleaned up will you, I’ve got people to talk to, I’ll be back later to see how it’s going.”
ACCIDENTAL BOSSCHECK SURVIVEDFail! Covered your boss in dead pigeon parts!
Morale Boost! Covered your boss in dead pigeon parts!
Morale Boost! Defended yourself against injustice!
Task Assigned! Hygienificate the dumpster area!
Failure Rating: 6.
Morale: 9.
Get a snack, then head back down to desk.
Getting out of the vicinity before Dr Erdleton notices his door is smashed into pieces, you head back down to your desk. On the way you visit the canteen to get a snack from the vending machine. You only want a quick Snickers and you pop your money in and press the button. Two fall out of the vending machine’s generous arm [5]! You happily continue on your way, munching along [6]. You bump into Emma from Accounts on your way. No, the reasonably hot one. In fact, she’s so reasonably hot you’ve never been able to say more than a few words to her. You try to smile and say hi and avoid anything more awkward.
“Oh hey Larry! You on your break? You wanna come and get a coffee with me in the canteen?”
Morale Boost! Extra snack!
No Task Assigned! Failure Rating: 12.
Morale: 1.
Kathryn is feeling better now. Let them do their worst!
She heads back to work, and appraises the damage...she figures if the blame falls on her, she'll probably be able to think of a decent lie...hmm. Blame Terrorists?
Actually, she had a whole spiel already worked up if someone confronted her.
You leave Costabucks and head back into work. An ambulance passes you on the way back in to the complex and you can see the burnt out wreck of your eighth floor office from down below. You take the lift up and as you approach your office, striding refreshedly down the corridor to where your office used to be, you see the boss storming towards you. Is that a pigeon feather stuck to his elbow? Anyhow, he seems dangerously calm as he speaks to you.
BOSSCHECK!“Kathryn. I’ve been speaking to the fire inspector and a couple of your colleagues after the fire was put out just now. It seems that it started on your desk. I’d be interested in hearing an explanation about that. I MEAN WHAT THE HELL DO YOU THINK YOU WERE UP TO, YOU BLITHERING IDIOT??”
Oh. Maybe not so calm. Anyway, you’ve rehearsed this moment for the last five minutes. Tears start pouring from your eyes [5].
“The Fire! The Fire! Oh dear lord! When I got to my workstation there was this strange red box sitting on top of my computer, see, and a note. It was made of freaky looking cut-up newspaper clippings. It said
"BRUCE HALFORD, STOP MAKING YOUR PERPETUAL MOTION DEVICE
-THE LAWS OF PHYSICS BLEED! WE ARE THE ORDER-OF-THE-TRANS-ATLANTIC-SEPARATIST-DRAGON-ARMY-OF FREEDOM
(OOTTASDAOF FTW!)
WE HAVE SPOKEN!1!!1
At least, I think it said
something like that. Then there was a flash...and a fire started. Oh, I'm so afraid...what if the terrorists have planted more bombs in the building?!”
A look of alarm crosses the boss’s face [6].
“What?! There are more terrorists?! JESUS. SHIT.” He calls Security on his phone. “Yeah. It’s me. We gotta problem. Apparently the fire was started by terrorists, and there’s more of ‘em in the building. What? I don’t know. The goddamn coffee machine. Yeah. I know. Unbelievable. Yeah, I suppose it was. Unnatural. Yeah. Ok, well, I’ll keep everyone calm in their offices until the SWAT teams get here then, if you really think that’s the best course of action. Yeah, we
have already lost a lot of man-hours. No, we
don’t wanna show them they’ve already beaten us. Ok, well, I have staff to check up on, call me back when you heard from the cops.”
He turns back to you,
“Kathryn, get over to Blue Square 23, there should be a spare workstation for you in the sub-sub-secretarial under-assistant bay. Doctor Erdleton says he’s emailed you an mp3 of a three hour teleconference he needs minuting up by the end of the day. Get to it, and keep quiet about the goddamn terrorists and that note, we already had enough problems from the church about that one and we’ve lost enough time today with the evacuation.”
He leaves without even asking you why you didn’t seem to be present at the fire roll-call.
“And sign up for some fire training!” he shouts from halfway down the corridor. “I’m sure you could have done better.”
BOSSCHECK PASSED!Morale Boost! Totally got away with that!
Task Assigned! Minute a teleconference recording!
Task Assigned! Sign up for some fire training!
Failure Rating: 15.
Morale: 7.
Throw a quarter of the papers in the trash to the pile visibly decreases in size. Then doodle on a paper, with another on hand to cover it up.
You dump a portion of the filing in a nearby trashcan and sit back whilst you look at the results. It sure does look like you’ve been busy. You start idly doodling on one of the sheets of paper, but the pen runs out halfway through your first drawing [2]. You’re just searching through your drawer for a replacement pen when a very angry looking boss bursts into your room. Is that… nah, why would he have a pigeon’s foot sticking out of his pocket?
BOSSCHECK!“Frederick, I’m getting pretty fed up of having to check up on you every ten minutes, I want to know why you aren’t down in the archive cupboard getting this stuff filed. I’ve had one HELL of a morning and you’re making it FAR WORSE singlehandedly. Now, tell me why you aren’t… WHO THE HELL IS THAT DRAWING MEANT TO BE? WHY ARE YOU DRAWING? You’re meant to be filing, not drawing! You’re a goddamn engineer, engineers don’t draw! If I wasn’t busy I’d bust your ass back down to sub-engineer right this second. Now, I wanna see you up in…”
His phone rings.
“What?? Professor Crack is already here? Ah. I’m on my way.”
He leaves without finishing his sentence, which you think might be a good thing.
BOSSCHECK FAILEDFail! You’re not filing those papers!
Morale Drop! Still didn’t get a chance to tell that %$@! what you think!
Task Assigned! File those stacks of paper!
Failure Rating: 14.
Morale: 2.
Toby tries to get himself cleaned up, hopefully by found a source of water (fountain, bathroom eg). After that he tries to get up to his cubical and tries to make a report on the research that he concluded.
Still on the run, you pass a bathroom and get cleaned up. Stripping off your disgusting shirt and scrubbing and scrubbing, you manage to get completely clean [6]! You even clean up the wound on your nether regions and pull out a few remaining shards of glass. The blood stops flowing and it looks a pretty professional job. Before leaving you dry your clothes under the hand dryer.
You still don’t have any trousers though, and you notice you’re half-dressed a few minutes later while typing at your desk just as the boss walks in. You hope
he doesn’t notice.
BOSSCHECK!“Toby Raah, WHAT THE HELL IS THIS SHIT? I’ve been looking all over for you, Dr Fleck said you stole her research material, pushed her over and then ran off, why aren’t you still in security? She said she sent for them, what the hell are you doing at your desk? She said you haven’t even completed the damn research yet and for all I know she’s probably STILL crying in the corner down in her lab. Come up to my office in fifteen minutes and if you’re not goddamn there on time I’m sending security down to turf you out. If there weren’t terrorists in the building I’d goddamn do it myself right now.”
Before you get a chance to say anything at all, he turns to leave. As he does, you noticed there seems to be some kind of feather stuck to the back of his jacket. Just as he opens the door, he pauses and turns.
“Are you… goddamnit son, WHERE THE HELL ARE YOUR TROUSERS?”
He storms out shaking his head and muttering angrily to himself.
BOSSCHECK FAILEDMorale Boost! All clean!
Morale Boost! Still enjoying the sweet taste of freedom!
Morale Drop! No chance to defend yourself!
Morale Drop! Extreme failing!
Fail! Why in the lord’s name have you got no trousers on?
Fail! Requested in the boss’s office!
Task Completed! The boss probably doesn’t care about the research anymore!
Task Assigned! Head to the boss’s office!
Failure Rating: 26.
Morale: -5.
WARNING! Your failure level indicates a level of performance that is NOT ACCEPTABLE at a successful company such as GenCorp. Unless it improves IMMEDIATELY you will be FIRED when the chance arises. You are NOT IMPORTANT enough to be fired by BRUCE HALFORD HIMSELF. Your Morale is NEGATIVELY affected by your impending unemployment.Edit: Surplus space spotted.