Naturally

“As a QA Evaluator I’d be working directly with the new technology being developed?”

You asked, mostly something to try and get a few slips of details from her, but Zoe simply nodded.

“The job would entail interacting with the new technology, maintaining care and observation of it, as well as reporting any flaws noticed so they can be researched further. The particular nature of this research requires an individual unrelated to its development to interact with it, sort of like a Schrödinger’s cat, sort of thing. If you know what to expect, you will only ever test what is expected.”

Zoe explained helpfully, and you nodded, considering your options… She’d said you were cleared, so the door was right in front of you. She’d assured you that you wouldn’t be in danger, and her motives for doing so seemed promising, not to mention, you’d been asking for something like this for months, what sort of hypocrite would ask for some research, any research, and then throw away the opportunity to work with the greatest minds in the company.

“Very well! It sounds like an excellent opportunity. When can I start?”

You asked, and Zoe’s face lit up. She stood and closed her laptop, beckoning to you as she headed for the door to the meeting room.

“Right now, I’ll call the guys to put your show on hiatus until we can be certain what amount of your time will be consumed with this task versus your regular work, most likely all of your time, but I wouldn’t exactly bar you from working on it during lulls in your researching.”

She explained, and you blinked, you got assigned to a new position instantly? You expected a grace period of a week or so to get things to a stopping point… But Zoe seemed so eager to show you what was up that you didn’t want to argue. As you followed her to the elevator, a man in black security garb rushed past and to another elevator, leaving you slightly befuddled, but not minding it. The elevator ride with Dr. Hildebrand would’ve been awkward, if not for her cutely humming along to the elevator music… A woman as beautiful as her had to be in a relationship of some kind, so you figured it best to avoid staring at her figure. When the elevator dinged to another, more secure floor, the security operative from before was waiting just outside the elevator, and handed you a new Employee ID badge, complete with your photo on it, seemingly taken from the laptop in the meeting room, and a new clearance level appropriate to your new position. You blinked in surprise… Is this what it was like working at the top? No bureaucracy, no wait times on ID printing? It made you wonder if they had a separate, better, cafeteria(they didn’t.)

“Anything I can know with my new snazzy badge..?”

You asked as you moved to follow after Zoe, who was already walking along. The security operative caught you by the shoulder and turned you to face him… He held up a small booklet in front of your face (“Life Destroying Clearance Level and You: How to Not Be Sued Out of Existence”) then tucked the booklet into your shirt pocket.

“Rule 7. Don’t walk and talk.”

He growled softly, and then turned to leave… It seemed as if even at this high a clearance level, passing people might have different specific tasks that didn’t overlap, so chatting about things that were supposed to be secretive in the halls would be a bad idea…

“Don’t mind Greg too much. He’s always been a tad uptight about stuff but we don’t really blame him for it.”

Zoe said as you caught up, already thumbing through the small book for extra tips of the like.

“I’ll just avoid getting on his bad side. He’s already been pretty helpful, if I’m being honest…”

You chuckled softly, slightly overwhelmed. You and Zoe passed office after office with blurred floor to ceiling glass walls that, while interesting, showed no explanation so as to the interiors.

“Fair, fair. Your office will be at the end of the hall, here, on the left.”

She said, and guided you there, gesturing to his office and listing off the names of the machines there, you recognized all but one of them thanks to your previous knowledge.

“That last one is a proprietary containment unit, so don’t worry about not recognizing it… It contains the subject of your research! Programmable cellular structures that can dissolve and rebind the bonds between molecules and atoms to create functionally anything. They can’t crack atoms, so no need to worry about leveling the facility, but do make sure they don’t go out of control. Can I leave you to the development dossier to catch up on your reading and we can reconvene in… Saaaay… 2 hours? It’s a small dossier because you’re the first to test with it in earnest.”

You simply nodded; the words she’d said made sense to you… Matter reconstruction and the like, programmable cells… But the implications and the meaning made it come off as something science fiction, your mind was stunned, to the point where you were being Punk’d just so someone could catch the stupendously dumb look on your face. Zoe giggled softly and stepped out of the room to leave you to it… And after a few moments you decided there was no way that dead tv show could do all of this, and got to work looking over all of the available info regarding the programmable matter…