Emily axe-kicked Melonie from HR. Melonie dropped to her knees but quickly recovered with a spin that knocked Emily off her feet. Emily heard the lining of her pencil skirt rip. She clenched her jaw and blocked a punch from Melonie. Emily grabbed a fist full of Melonie’s hair and flipped her to the ground. She would have gone for Melonie’s throat next but Robert had slammed Emily into the copier. Without hesitation, Emily dodged another attack from him, felled Melonie once again, and went for the community knife which she used to pin Robert’s, and subsequently, Robert, to the wall. She had just milliseconds to block Melonie and swing her around with her arms incapacitated in Emily’s grip. “Why was accounting at my house yesterday?” Emily stretched Melonie’s arms up against her spine a little more, just for the ripped skirt.
Melonie grunted. “I’m not the one to ask. I just do what I’m told.”
“No!” Robert hissed from his spot against the kitchen wall. “You’re so weak, Melonie.”
Emily’s fists clenched tighter over Melonie’s wrists. “Shut up, Robert,” Emily spat. “You’re the one who can’t even pull a knife out of a wall.”
There was suddenly an arrogant type of high-heeled clicking coming from the hall. Everyone froze to listen for half a moment before swinging into coverup position. Emily adjusted the copier back into place while Melonie freed Robert from his stainless steel bind. The knife was thrown to the sink with a scraping clank. Robert picked up an empty coffee mug and leaned against the counter. Melonie began copying a blank sheet of paper. Emily opened the refrigerator, immediately regretting it once the smell of weeks old Chinese cuisine filled her nostrils.
The manager appeared around the corner. The smell of musky flowers already clogged the kitchen air vents. “Emily, what are you doing? There is a line of clients waiting for you,” The manager snipped.
Emily took a moment to imagine slamming the fridge door on the manager's neck before turning around. “Oh shoot. Sorry about that. Time got away from me.”
The manager huffed and folded her arms.
Emily glided past her with all the restraint she could find back to the front desk where a red-faced lawyer was about to rip out of his middle-class suit because he had been waiting 5 minutes.
Lunch came slowly but finally. Emily had almost made it out the door before she realized that she had forgotten to clock out. There was one woman at the desk. Emily directed her to the correct appointment room before rushing to clock out and make herself scarce. She could feel the new hole in her skirt lining had widened. She got in line for a sandwich, sighed, and dialed Aaron.
“Hey, how’s it going?” He said.
“Rough morning. How about you?”
“I’m sorry to hear that. I’m alright. What happened?”
“I got nothing out of HR. They admitted to sending in accounting but they don’t know why. Did you get anywhere?”
“The accountants aren’t talking, as suspected. I figured we can interrogate them more tonight.”
“What are you up to today?”
“I’m in Belgium having dinner with that harpsichord band right now.”
“Ah, Les Cordes Bruyantes. Are you having a good time?”
“Yes. By the way, we should be expecting a harpsichord in the mail.”
“What for?”
“I restrung and tuned a couple of their instruments during an intermission.”
A drunken slur of French could be heard in the background of Aaron’s phone, then a communal shout of joy from a few others.
“Aaron started shouting over the noise. Anyway, I’ll pick up Emerson from school on my way back. I love you!” And he was gone.
Emily pushed back the wave of jealousy she felt. She had always been the one to pick up Emerson from school, which was her favorite part of her day. But now, with this nine to five nightmare she was living, she barely had the emotional stamina to motivate herself to ask him about his day. She ordered a subpar sandwich and ate it quickly on her way back to the office.
It was 3pm when the manager went home. Emily had just received a text from Aaron, “I got Emerson from Paris. We are on our way home. Emerson said he liked his field trip but he lost his Pokemon cards sometime after lunch :/ Don’t wait up for us! Love you”
Emily shoved her phone into a drawer when she heard the domineering presence coming up behind her.
“The cleaning crew isn’t getting those back windows well enough. Wipe them down please,” The manager said without looking up from her own phone while she stopped to wait for the elevator.
Emily didn’t respond. She clenched the muscles in her calves just to ease some tension but also because she had hardly moved from her chair in a few hours. She was stiff, and tired, and unmotivated. She wanted to simultaneously vandalize the entire office and take a bubble bath. Once the manager had disappeared behind the elevator doors, Emily went for the glass cleaner and shuffled over to the back windows of the lobby area. There were fingerprints all over the glass. Emily couldn’t find the energy to care one way or the other. She was beginning to wonder what the point of her existence was at all. After cleaning the windows, she decided to take a break. She passed by her manager’s office on the way to the break room. After 2 days working under that woman, Emily had broken in and searched the entire floor. There was nothing. It was all bone dry. Sure, she had found a few names and linked them as spies, but there was nothing on the manager. The one thing she hadn’t been able to get to yet was the laptop. The manager always had it but never left it unattended. The same went for her phone. There was only one wild card Emily had left, but she had no idea if Aaron would go for it.
With no manager about, Emily took a few extra minutes on her break. She heard the phone ring but ignored it. It was not important. It was never important. Finally, she returned to her desk. What she found was a box. A computer printed note was tied around it. Everything you need, it said. Emily took a moment to gingerly examine the wooden box before opening it. Inside she found a thick, glass ball. It was a swirling blue color with a creased line running along the circumference. Clearly, it was meant to be opened. Emily clocked out an hour early.
“What is this?” Emily shoved the glass ball into the face of an accountant. All three of them were enjoying dinner in the underground holding lair. Aaron had designed it. In its simplicity it was cozy but Emily described it as luxurious. It was pristine and always smelled of air-fresh linens. Meals were served hot and in several courses with allergies taken into consideration. The prisoners were well looked after until anything untoward was found out during interrogations. At that point, they were dangled over the alligator pit. Innocent until proven guilty.
“I’ve never seen that in my life.”
“We’ll see,” Emily said. She marched out of the holding rooms. There were scanners in every corner that measured and matched the height, weight, blood pressure, and the very DNA of each prisoner. If any of them tried to leave they would end up unconscious. Emily passed through security, traveled the catacombs of the lair, and up the secured elevator to her penthouse. She spent 2 hours sparring in the boxing ring with punching targets. After a shower she got into bed, huffing and waiting for Aaron. The glass ball was in her lap. It hadn’t opened through force. It hadn’t opened with any of her various hacking tools. It didn’t react to electricity. Aaron may have a good idea but if he wasn’t home soon, she was going to break it apart.
Emily had fallen asleep. She was awakened by the tiny kiss of her son who was mostly asleep himself. Through her hazed eyes, she could see Aaron carrying him off to put Emerson to bed. Emily pushed herself to a sitting position, trying to shake the fatigue. Aaron was back. He changed out of his clothes and rolled into bed beside her. Emily put the glass ball at eye level. “I found this on my desk today. Someone left it there with a note.”
Aaron was frowning. “That’s impossible,” he said. He took the ball from her.
“What? Do you know what it is?”
Aaron was out of bed. He pressed his hand to the scanner inside the closet. A door popped open behind his suit rack. She got up and followed him into his workspace. Along a back wall were hundreds of shelves, each one opened only by a separate key code. Aaron was crouched at a bottom shelf. He opened the drawer. Inside were a dozen glass balls identical to the one he still had in his hand. “I invented these,” he said. “They’re like journals. I use them for storing ideas and memories for my work. I have no idea how someone could have gotten one. They’ve never left this room.”
“How do we open it?”
“We can’t. Not without some stealth."
TO BE CONTINUED...
