Maniac’s Mayhem: A guide to being a corporate slave

There is nothing scarier than two samurai dating each other. In the best case, you have unpredictable toddlers with alien weapons where you are lucky if they like each other enough to spend only time with each other.

Things get messier as soon as they break up, or the Protectors forbid if one finds out the other is cheating.

— Things worse than the plagues of Egypt, part 4. By the Purple Truth.

I wake up luxuriating in the feeling of a nice, warm bed. Also, with the nice, warm feeling of a girl, I turn slightly to the side to see Claire curled up and pressed against me. Last night was amazing, and she was a big reason as to why it was such a great night. She is really cute, and being with her feels right somehow. It’s kind of hard to quantify. Now, I am hoping she likes me just as much as I like her.

I reactivate my sensors and crawl out of bed carefully, trying my best not to rouse the still-sleeping girl. I grab some nice clothing and throw them on; then, I quickly head to the bedroom to do my hair and make-up. This is my first day on the job. I better look fancy while I do it. I slowly walk back into the room. These sensors are amazing for sneaking around; I don’t have to turn on the lights or anything, can just walk without issues. Somehow, our date helped a lot as well. I am not fully the same as I was before, but at least I don’t want to throw up every time I move. Sadly, big and fast movements are still beyond me.

“Evelin?” a groggy voice says from the bed.

I make it over to the bed, leaning over to give the girl a kiss. “I have to go. I have a meeting I probably should not miss, but you can sleep for a bit longer if you want.” I say while stroking her cheek with my right hand.

“Okay,” she says in a somewhat more disappointed tone, “Before you go, I want another kiss.”

I chuckle and then lean in to satisfy the request. Her arms come out from under the covers and around my neck, keeping me in place. We stay like that for a bit until I am finally released. I look down at her, the blanket having fallen away, revealing her… two personalities and I am almost tempted to come up with an excuse to stay here.

I swallow deeply. “Okay, it’s time for me to go. See you later.”

I make it out of the room and into the hotel hall. I do a quick camera scan of the building, looking for Daisy, but the little sneak seems to have found her way into Rose’s room, where she is currently sleeping on the foot end of the bed.

I enter the lobby and then go down to one of the floors with a sky bridge to one of the other mega buildings. I put on my sunglasses to hide my closed eyes and start weaving in and out of the streets. Making my way through the complex maze that are mega buildings until I reach the Blue Sky Bar. The thing is situated in the nicer part of town. It's high up, with a window on the southside overlooking most of the corporate hellscape of the city. I make my way to the greeter, turning off my sensors and storing away my sunglasses.

“Hello, I am here to see Edward Argaria,” I say to the lady at the front.

“May I have your name, please?” the woman asks with a pleasant smile.

“Evelin Vance.”

“You’re on the list, meeting room three.” The woman says while pointing at a door at the far end of the bar with a stylised three on it.

“Thank you,” I say before heading to the indicated room.

I walk to the… bar? It's not really a bar, but more a fancy restaurant, if anything. I am not rich enough to care either way. I knock on the door and then open it, heading inside. Inside, there is Edward and some guards, denoted by their uniforms and visible weapons. Besides those people, there are five other ones wearing, well, it almost looks like whatever they could find. Two are wearing suits, one is wearing a lab coat of all things, and the last is everyday streetwear.

“Welcome, Evelin. Sit down. You are the last one to arrive.” Edward says, a smile on his face.

“Sorry for being late.” I say as I take the closest seat. Putting myself between the labcoat guy and Edward.

“You are actually 10 minutes early,” Edward says. “But since everyone is here, we can start.” Edward puts some kind of vape to the side and opens a case with seven data shards.

“Wait, we are just going to let this girl in without any screening?” a woman says, dressed in an outfit that fits more in any local street gang than in a business meeting.

“Eva is right. We don’t know her. How can we trust her with our vital information?” the man sitting opposite of Edward says.

“According to her file, she is a basic worker doing disability for the main branch; the only thing special about her would be that she is dating Cierra Argaria.” A smaller woman says, her head just peeking out over the frankly massive tablet.

Edward turns to me. “Evelin, would you be so kind as to explain what your job was?”

“Sure, I used to do cyber security, ensuring we did not have massive data breaches.”

“That is it?” the man scoffs, “I understand that you want to help your sister's girlfriend, but this is dangerous, Edward. We can’t be working with amateurs.”

Dangerous, well, this meeting suddenly got more interesting. I do my own check, running the different faces of the people through a face recognition software and extracting any data that I can find.

Edward smiles at the man. “I know. That is why I brought her here, but I guess a demonstration is in order.” Edward turns to me. “Evelin, if you would be so kind, show us your full capability.”

I stand up, cracking my neck, doing my best to suppress a grin. “I am sure you all have a reason to be mistrustful, so let me clear some air. What I mostly do is not cyber security. What I usually do is the reason other people require cyber security.”

I point at the man. “ You are John Everett Stone. You are married with two kids, a boy and a girl, but your marriage is falling apart. This is probably because of the fact that you are cheating on her with your assistant, and your wife has enough evidence for a divorce.”

Then I switch, pointing at the woman who first called me out. “Eva Dondero, born in Spain, never had a boyfriend or anything like that. You say that is because your job takes too much time, but it is actually because you are in love with a high-profile doll and spending most of your money there.”

Then I switch to Tablet Girl. “Mio Shia Takanashi, you… fuck, ewh, that is disgusting.” I say, opening a folder of fetishes I had not even heard of. “Why the plants? I don’t think they are good sexual partners. Also, I think it is kind of unprofessional to blackmail executives of other branches.”

I am about to turn to the next person but am interrupted by Edward loudly clearing his throat. “I think that is enough, Evelin. I think you have proven your capabilities.”

I just shrug and sit back down, all the while ignoring the angry glares from the people around me.

“I hope that makes her capabilities clear?” Edward says.

“You are a fucking black cube hacker.” Mio says, a bit of respect in her eyes.

I just nod, not knowing what the term means. I never really kept up with programmer slang. It is a language that changes a lot and rapidly. My takeaway has always been if they call you something with respect, just nod along with it.

A lanky man in the lab coat sitting next to me raises his hand in question; Edward just sighs and nods at him.

“I- I was just wonnderinnngg how longg did it ta-ake you to get in,” the man stutters out.

“How long it took me to get that data?” I ask, and he nods. “I mean less than a minute. This is the first time I have met any of you, so I did not have any info prepared. Most of it was public record. Or just camera surveillance.”

“Getting back on topic, the reason why I brought Evelin in was her capabilities. We need her help on the Myca Co case,” Edward says while taking out one of the shards and pushing the case forward.

I take out one of the shards, moving my hair around so I can insert the shard in a port on the back of my neck. The data loads instead on my AUG gear, and I open the corresponding files. In short, it is a mess to make sure the data is organised and structured with different patents, blueprints and expenditures all laid out. No, what makes it a mess is its sheer scope. It is over a terabyte worth of files, and the overwhelming majority are text files.

“What am I looking at?” I finally ask.

Eva snickers “What? Can’t the big hacker girl not figure it out,”

I turn to Edward, raising one eyebrow. “This is all the data we have on Myca Co.” He says.

“I got that, but the data here goes back five years or so. If you want to know what it means, a data analyst might be better.” I say.

“The interesting part is not what is there but what is not there.” the last man, who had not spoken so far, tells me with a smile. A quick search revealed that his name was Davis, and he was a data analyst. Well, I guess they did have one.

I take another look at the data, looking for any inconsistencies.” Everything seems to be there from 5 years up till about a month ago.”

“And therein lies the problem: these updates should have been more recent; at the latest, the data should be a day or so old, not an entire month old.” Davis answered.

“So what, the spy went dark?” I ask.

“All of them went dark.” John says, “Even independent contractors hired went dark, not even a body showing up.”

“Ah, so Myca Co is rooting out spies, then the question is why.” I state..

“Yes!” Edward exclaimed. “That is why I put this task force together; Myca Co is New Foods' biggest competitor. If they are up to something, I want to know. All of you, with the exception of Evelin, have already been working on getting more data and are familiar with the case.”

I let out a deep sigh and chuckled a bit.

“Something funny?” John asks in a stern tone.

“Not sure if funny is the right word.” I say, “It was just when someone said this was dangerous. I was expecting something like disabling a nuke, not some corporate espionage.”

“You do realise that the operatives that went dark most likely got killed, their bodies are never seen again.” Eva says, unamused.

“They work in food processing; most likely, the bodies were processed into food.” I say, “But that is not a new thing. Whacking spies is almost natural.”

“I like to see you be this jovial about it when your life is on the line,” Eva grumbles.

“We are getting nowhere like this.” John says. “Edward, what is the idea?”

“We can’t gain any access to the data from here, so you all will have to go to their headquarters in Zurich. Zurich will be having a pride festival soon. This means a higher influx of people, so you can all sneak in with a lot less scrutiny. Your goal is to find out what they're hiding and, if possible, retrieve it.”

“What is our equipment like?” John asks.

“A fully stocked infiltration van, a civilian armour plate hovercar. Five drones. And a few cards with enough funds on them so you would be able to acquire anything else you would need.”

I whistle at these kinds of missions. The only thing I have is a rickety laptop and a data shunt. “Those are fancy toys.” I say.

“Correct, but Davis has assured me it is necessary,” Edward says.

I look at Davis. He just nods at me.

“Well, I guess we have the proper equipment; let's see what we are all working with. I will introduce myself first. I am John. I work in security and am a weapons expert. If a fight starts, I am in charge.” John says.

“I am Eva, an infiltrator. I get into places quietly to steal stuff.” Eva says.

“I am Davis, a data analyst. I am not sure how much use I will have on missions, but I can quickly decipher any data we acquire.”

“Micheal, bio-engineer,” Micheal says at a good speed.

“I am Mio, a decent hacker who mostly focuses on creating forgeries.” She says, while staring at me.

“Well, I guess I am last. I am Evelin. You have already seen that I am a hacker but have done some infiltration and mechanics work, too.”

“Okay, everyone.” John says. “I will be the leader of this mission. The time frame is short, but not that short; we will be gathering in a training hall tomorrow. I want to see what you are all capable of before heading out. I expect all of you to have sorted out your affairs before then, and then we can leave at any moment after we have gathered. Any questions?"

When no one answers, he just nods and stands up. “Well, that is all. Make sure to enjoy the rest of your day since we are working hard from now on.” With that, John stands up and casually leaves the meeting room.

Slowly, everyone stands up to leave. As I get ready to leave, Edward stops me.

“Evelin a moment if you don’t mind” he says.

“Sure,” I say, trying to sit down again.

“Let's talk at the bar; less stuffy, and there is alcohol there,” he says before walking out.

I follow closely behind him, wondering what is going on.