Survivanoia by Baroness Von Smith

Author:Baroness Von Smith [Smith, Baroness Von]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781469905181
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 12

“Scally” paced his new office, larger and brighter than his first apartment. Like his nickname, Sydney’s new office was something to which he quickly became accustomed. His nickname had come his first day on the job, when the break room scared him a little and reminded him of the stories he’d been told of Ellis Isle. Six different languages filled the place and nobody got to keep his name. Poo-ah-LAH-ni? How about we call you Loni? Scalinescu? S-c-a- Scally, got it, okay. Next! Thus he ‘d been christened by Mongo and Boozey, the maintenance manager and head mechanic, respectively, over sixteen years ago.

The new office had come just a few months ago as part of his new position—VP of Product Development. Along with the fancy title, they’d awarded him the center office on the second floor, overlooking the courtyard housed in the U of the new building. Survivanoia engineers had designed and erected this facility especially for the company, and it couldn’t have been better. The layout ensured everybody, even the production workers, a view of the outdoors. The managers, Scally included, all had balconies, in case they cared to use them.

At the moment, a Mr. Sanchez sat on Scally’s balcony, slurping coffee and gazing dreamily at the garden beneath him. A wooden box fraught with knobs and meters sat on Scally’s desk. Mr. Sanchez had brought it with him. Scally had recently tucked a set of plans for a similar product into a desk drawer. Those plans had come from a different man, a strange little scientist named Encludsmo Stuckhowsen who had come in days earlier to see the Baroness, the new company president.

The scientist had spoken such bad English that the Baroness switched him to German and translated for Scally. The little Doctor offered pages and pages of theoretical calculations explaining how pretension could be extrapolated from changes in micro-atmospheric conditions knowing this and that and blah. He’d described in vast detail the jobs of all the individual transistors, every bit of wire, each LED in his proposed “Pretentiometer”. What The Doctor hadn’t provided was a prototype.

Mr. Sanchez presented the opposite situation. The stocky, brown-suited man had shown up first thing that morning, unannounced, asking to speak with anybody in the Marketing group. They were about to shoo him out the door when Scally arrived, bleary eyed and clutching coffee, heard the man mumble something about “pretension meter” and saw the box in Sanchez’s thick hands. Scally had swooped him upstairs.

Now he picked the box from his desk. Nailed shut, couldn’t see the insides. Seemed lighter than what Stuckhowsen’s plans suggested. He carried it into the midday heat on the balcony.

Mr. Sanchez smiled. “Well? Is good, huh?” He patted his pompadour, greasy in the heat.

“It’s certainly a good idea, Mr. Sanchez. But I need you to prove how it works.”

“You want me to give away my secrets?”

“Not at all. But I wouldn’t, say, buy a car, without asking some questions, kicking the tires.”

“Do you know how your car works?”

Scally paused, laughed.

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