Page 16 of Colin Gets Promoted and Dooms the World

“What’s out there. If there’s more than this tedious bullshit everyone calls life.

” They shrugged and looked away. “I didn’t want to live on Staten Island forever like my parents had, and their parents.

I wanted more. So I followed a bunch of clues about this book, and they took me all the way to New Orleans and a tiny bookshop in the French Quarter. ”

“And, what, it was all a hoax? There was no book?” I guessed.

“Oh, no, there was a book. It wasn’t written by the Devil, obviously, because he’s barely literate, but it was written by some big shot in Hell.

Only, I couldn’t read it, because it was in one of the more obscure Dialects of Sin.

Kind of disappointing, if I’m honest. I took some photos on my phone while the old guy running the store was distracted, and then I posted them on a few Reddit subs.

I guess that got someone’s attention, because while I was waiting for the bus back to New York, a woman approached me and offered me a job with Dark Enterprises. ”

I was rapt. “Just like that?”

Lex shrugged again. “Yeah. Two days later, I was working in the Repository here. That was almost four years ago now.”

Leaning back in my chair, I thought for a moment. “And are you glad you signed up?”

Lex’s eyebrows rose once more. “Glad? Fuck yes. I was maybe a month away from being homeless when DE found me. The problem with not fitting in anywhere is that no one cares if you sink or swim. The company threw me a lifeline, and I grabbed it.” They played absently with the book in front of them.

“Now, is the job perfect? No. I keep pissing people off, and that means I’ll probably be reshelving books as a Class 5 librarian for the rest of my life.

But I’m part of a world that’s so much cooler than anything I could have imagined when I was a kid. ”

I gazed down at the table as I considered their story.

Dark Enterprises had given Lex the things they wanted most—knowledge, and also the freedom to be themself.

It could give me everything I wanted, too.

Over the past week I’d already caught glimpses of the power I craved.

That power would never be mine if the Thing had its way, but if I figured out what Management had bound all those millennia ago, maybe I could find a way to stop it.

I could seize the greatness I’d been promised and save the world along the way.

“What about you?” Lex asked. “How did you end up here?”

“That’s a funny story, actually,” I said, staring off into the middle distance. “It all started with a phone call…”

I was working at a tiny accounting firm down by the Battery (I said to Lex), trudging each morning to a job I hated because, well, that’s what you did in your twenties.

I’d escaped Ohio the year before and arrived in New York City with dreams of an exciting, fulfilling life that I could live on my own terms. Like countless others before me, however, I’d quickly discovered that the city didn’t give a crap about me or my dreams. Stuffed into a cramped little cubicle in an office that smelled like bologna and wet dog, I told myself every day that this was a stepping stone to something bigger.

I had lots of time to make my mark on the world, to finally have respect and power, maybe even love.

Then I would look around at the sad, beaten-down people in the cubicles around me, most of whom had worked there for decades, and try not to weep.

The phone on my desk had never rung before, so when it shrilled abruptly in the middle of a Tuesday morning, I lunged for it out of sheer instinct. “Hello?” I said loudly while fumbling the handset up to my ear.

“Is this Colin Harris?” The voice was feminine, the tone coolly polite.

“Uh, yes.” I glanced around. People were watching me.

“Mr. Harris, I’d like to extend an invitation to interview with us later this week.”

I was silent while my mind struggled to catch up. “I’m sorry. Who are you?”

“My name is Samantha Price. I work for a company called Dark Enterprises.”

“I’m afraid I’ve never heard of you. Them. It.”

A note of amusement entered her voice. “I would be very surprised if you had. How does Thursday morning work for you? Say, ten o’clock?”

“I don’t understand. How did you find me?”

“Let me know when you have a pen handy, Mr. Harris, and I’ll give you the address.”

I stared blankly at the screen of my antiquated computer.

Was this a thing that happened in New York?

People randomly called you up and invited you to a job interview?

Maybe it was a scam. In fact, the more I thought about it, the more certain I became.

Why would anyone want to hire me? I had precious few skills and barely any experience.

No, it was far more likely that this woman was trying to lure me to an abandoned building site where a team of illicit surgeons would remove both my kidneys.

That was the kind of thing that happened in New York.

“Thank you,” I said at last, “but I already have a job. And it’s great. Really.”

As soon as the words left my mouth, I became aware of a strange snuffling noise from the cubicle across from mine.

Pushing my chair back, I looked over and saw Ahmad, a quiet octogenarian who wore the same suit every day, experiencing some sort of paroxysm.

Abruptly, he convulsed and gave vent to a thunderous sneeze.

Something flew out of his mouth and hit my shoe: his dentures, now sitting on the drab industrial carpet, glistening wetly.

Time stopped, and in that single, eternal moment I watched my future unfurl before me. I knew, with perfect clarity, that if I stayed in this job, one day it would be me sneezing my false teeth onto the newest hire.

“On second thought,” I said into the phone, “let me grab a pen.”

Two days later, I walked into an innocuous, unmarked office tower made of smoked black glass, nestled in the heart of Midtown.

Waiting to meet me in the lobby was Ms. Price, a short white woman with auburn hair styled in a severe bob.

I followed her into an elevator where she pressed a button labeled Client Services, and two minutes later we were in a small, expensively appointed conference room where glass walls offered a sweeping view of the buildings on the other side of Fifth Avenue.

She offered me designer water and Italian espresso, and when I refused both, she gestured for me to sit in the chair on one side of the table before taking a seat herself and folding her hands together on top of a blank notepad.

“Thank you for meeting with me, Colin.” Her voice was a soothing contralto with a faint Southern twang. “Your name came up as we started considering candidates for this position, and I’m glad to be able to talk to you face-to-face.”

“I’m very happy to be here,” I said with a nervous smile. I extracted a copy of my résumé from the cheap plastic folder on my lap and slid it across the table. She didn’t so much as glance at it. “May I ask how you got my name?”

“We have our sources,” she replied smoothly, “and they spoke highly of your potential.”

This struck me as unlikely. I barely knew anyone in the city, and I certainly hadn’t distinguished myself at the accounting firm, what with the repeated instances of sleeping on the job. “That’s great,” I said, lamely.

An uncomfortable silence fell between us. Her eyes were fixed on me with an unsettling intensity, and I rubbed my sweating palms on my khakis before clearing my throat. “Um. So, I’m afraid I don’t know what this company actually does. I couldn’t find anything online.”

Ms. Price considered me for another long moment before speaking.

“In partnership with various independent entities, we leverage human potential in order to facilitate the accumulation and expenditure of renewable energies so as to effect lasting change in contexts that range from local to global in scale.”

I tried to parse this statement and got absolutely nowhere.

“That sounds very innovative,” I finally said.

“I’m excited to synergize my talents with your core competencies and move the needle on constructing a new paradigm.

” Thank goodness I’d stayed up late the night before reading Business Jargon for Dummies.

One eyebrow twitched, but her face remained otherwise frozen in its pleasant expression.

“As I said, you’re a promising candidate, but we look for truly exceptional people here at Dark Enterprises.

People with goals and ambitions that coincide with our values.

” She picked up an expensive-looking fountain pen and tapped it against the notepad in front of her.

“What do you want from your ideal job, Colin?”

“More than anything,” I replied earnestly, “I want to make a difference.”

“How noble. But what do you want for yourself?”

I thought about this for a moment. “Um. A competitive pension plan?”

Ms. Price looked at me in silence before reaching out and pressing a button on the small device in the middle of the table.

I’d assumed it was an intercom, but when she touched it, the wall at the far end of the table abruptly brightened.

What had been a wide mirror was now a window looking into a harshly lit room paneled entirely in shining black stone.

At its center, an attractive twenty-something white man sat upright in a padded chair.

My mouth fell open.

“Can you see the individual in the next room?” Ms. Price asked me.

Turning to stare at her, I nodded uncertainly.

“He is connected to a device that will administer an electric shock whenever you press this button.” She pushed a small piece of black plastic across the table.

I waited for her to continue, but she just looked at me. “Okay,” I said at last.

“Would you care to try it?” she asked.