Page 13 of The Revenge Game

Given that I wrote the code underpinning their whole database, it will be slightly embarrassing if I’m unable to troubleshoot any issues.

My nerves begin to settle. I can do this. It’s only a job.

There’s a noise at the door and I glance up as a guy slouches into the room. His hair is oily, and he’s wearing a T-shirt with the Dragon’s Sphere logo, which I recognize immediately, having spent a lot of my high school and college years obsessed with the game.

“Ah…hi,” I say awkwardly.

“Hullo,” he says in a monotone voice.

“I’m Drew. Harriet’s replacement.”

“I’m Xander,” he mutters without making eye contact as he sits in his cubicle.

When Adam breezes into the room five minutes later, he’s the opposite of Xander. He’s all about eye contact while he shakes my hand intensely.

“Nice to meet you, Drew. I’m Adam, the systems administrator. I saw on your résumé that you’ve only worked at smaller companies before. Don’t worry, I’ll explain anything that confuses you.” He gives me a smile that could power an entire condescension factory. “People often find our systems quite overwhelming at first.”

“Ah…thank you. I appreciate that,” I say.

As Adam explains the NovaCore system, I discover it’s uniquely humbling having to feign ignorance about code I wrote during a caffeine-fueled weekend when I was nineteen. I imagine this is how Shakespeare would feel if he had to sitthrough a high school teacher explaining the “possible meaning” behind Hamlet while biting his immortal tongue.

“And the beauty about the NovaCore system is the way it’s designed to prevent database conflicts while maintaining optimal processing speed.”

Thanks, Adam. I’ll take that compliment.

As Adam continues to explain the system architecture, pausing at each feature to ensure I’m sufficiently impressed, my mind wanders back to when I first got the idea that underpins the NovaCore product range.

It was during my Information Technology class my freshman year of high school.

After watching the system freeze up when too many students tried to access the same files, I’d outlined ideas in my notebook about a system that could prevent users from interfering with each other’s work. I never imagined that, one day, it’d be the first major product in my tech company.

Ironically, that Information Technology class was also when Justin and his friends first started bullying me.

Up until that point, high school had been going okay for me.

I’d grown up in a rural area just outside San Antonio. It had been a big adjustment coming from a small, rural middle school to the enormous Coyote Creek High School, with over fifteen hundred students.

I’d vaguely known who Justin was before high school because he’d attended my elementary school for six months in fifth grade.

I remembered him as a quiet kid who once helped me catch my escaped hamster during show and tell, crawling under desks with me until we cornered Mr. Whiskers together.

He’d moved away during the summer between fifth and sixth grade, one of those people who slipped out of your life and you never thought about again.

But in high school, I definitely noticed him. As a freshman, he was named captain of the junior varsity team, which immediately propelled him to the upper echelons of the social ladder. All the cheerleaders hung around him, squabbling like seagulls around a dropped ice cream cone.

When I noticed Justin and his football friends Tad and Connor sitting behind me in the Information Technology class, I hadn’t had any sense of foreboding that this would be the turning point in my high school career, setting the stage for the years of misery to come.

About a week in, most of the class locked themselves out of their accounts trying to access the new online textbook platform. Twenty frustrated faces stared at error messages on login screens while Mr. Peterson attempted to help.

I’d slipped from desk to desk, walking each person through the reset process, keeping my voice low and explanations simple.

“Thank you so much for your help, Andrew,” Mr. Peterson said as I returned to my seat. “It’s handy to have you in class.”

Connor had turned around with that smirk I’d come to recognize as his signal that he’d found fresh entertainment.

“He’s Handy Andy,” he’d said, sliding a look at Justin. I’d already noticed how everyone in the popular crowd seemed to look to Justin for approval. It was like Connor was a wolf showing his pack leader he’d picked up a scent.

There was a moment where time seemed to pause. Justin, with his golden-boy looks and quarterback shoulders in his letterman jacket, his light-brown hair still damp from morning practice, turned to look at me.