It was in the age of Gamagin when the Nakara Corporation's management team conducted the first of its "Sisyphus" studies. After facilitating many focus groups and restructuring the team countless times, the Sisyphus report (phase one) came back with the conclusion:
"Motivational art in the workplace increases productivity and enhances morale while reducing stress on male employees age 25 to 55."
Thus, a project plan was struck, and a risk manager was hired to lead a new team. After an eon of debate, and long nights poring over building maps with the facilities manager, procurement services finally had some numbers to work with. The Nakara Corporation sent out requests for tender. Months were spent in negotiation, and in spite of a well-publicized police investigation into collusion, a contract was drawn up with a company called The Black Circle Society. The first of the art arrived quickly, and the carpentry department, a division of plant operations, donned their green uniforms and took up their levels and drills like soldiers called to arms. They worked tirelessly to frame and hang the art, but the project was stalled twice due to contract negotiations with the union and another time due to vendor bankruptcy.
Legend has it that there are still thousands, upon thousands, of truckloads of motivational art sitting in crates in the Nakara facilities warehouse. While many have been driven mad by the endless task of framing and hanging all the art, management at Nakara feel confident that the completion of the project is on the horizon. Graphs have been drawn, spreadsheets crafted, and projections for the completion date fall sometime between the end of the age of Bushyasta and the beginning of the age of Drekavak.
All sorts of photographs were used for the motivational poster art (verdant forests, racing motorcycles, soaring eagles, sailboats at full tilt, frying eggs), but inscribed beneath each and every photograph was the same sort of motivational message, the same kind of mundane greeting card sentiments and quotes void of all context that serve to gaslight only the thickest numbskulls and most shameless boot-lickers that the office cubicles can contain. The poster on my wall depicted a lone mountain climber ascending a snowy peak of unknown proportions. In the distance, an endless range of smaller peaks flowed all the way to the horizon. It was captioned, in capital letters:
"ONLY THOSE WHO RISK THE PERILS OF THE JOURNEY CAN REACH THE HEIGHTS OF SUCCESS. Susan Jones."
What a load of shit, I thought as I stared at those snowcapped peaks.
That is when I noticed that the red light on my phone was lit up. I had somehow missed a call.
"Sigh," I sighed, and pressed the VTRC (Voicemail Telephone Retrieval Code) and listened to the mechanical voice on the answering service. "You have two waiting messages. To listen to your messages, press six."
I pressed six. "Beep"
"Sorry, I didn't get that. Please try again."
I pressed six again. "Beep."
"Sorry, I didn't get that. Please try again."
"Come on," I spat beneath my breath. I pressed the worn six button again.
"Beep."
"To hear your message, please press six."
"What a piece of garbage," I muttered and pressed six.
"Sorry, I didn't get that. Please try again."
I took a deep breath and pressed six again.
"Beep."
"Sorry, I didn't get that. Please try again."
"God! What an asshole you are."
"Hey, can you watch your language please?"
"..." For a moment I thought the phone had answered me but quickly realized that it was Lucy, the woman in the cubicle next to mine, who had spoken. Lucy popped her head over the partition that separated us. She glared at me.
"What?" I said.
"Whadya you mean what? We're at work," Lucy said.
"No, I mean, like what for? Why, Lucy? Tell me why I should watch my language."
"Code 17. Section 9 point 2 in the employee code of conduct handbook," Lucy said. "Thou shalt not use offensive language in the workplace. I will talk to Mr. Bauer and he will write you up."
"I'm so scared, Lucy," I said. "We're in Hell already. Case you hadn't noticed. How are they going to make my life any worse?"
Lucy grimaced, her lipstick smeared over a festering herpes sore, and she sat down, loudly typing away on her computer. Peck. Peck. Peck.
I went back to concentrating on the phone. Where was I? Oh yeah, of course. "Six. Okay. Bloody six. How many times should I press it? Why can't IT fix this phone system?"
I heard a click and some static on the other end of the phone. Either the connection had dropped, or the system was kicking over to the answering service. I pinned the receiver in the crook of my neck, and I picked up the photograph of Alice off my desk. Using bent paper clips that I had mangled specifically for this purpose and some tacks, I hooked Alice overtop of the mountainscape.
The picture of Alice was the only thing I had left of my life before the Nakara Corporation. I don't even really know how I came to have the picture. One day it appeared on my desk. I didn't ask any questions. Alice was about seven years old in the photograph, and she wore pigtails and a flowered dress that my mother had made for her. She was all long arms and tanned skinny legs and a crooked smile. My little sister, Alice.
I heard a click on the phone. "Message one." An androgynous, robotic sounding voice began to speak: "This is not a test. There has been an NLED breech."
Unbelievable. Zombies. Can this day get any worse? I wondered.
