Chaos at the workplace

As Sam had predicted, it was chaos at work.

He had just left the elevator and entered his office floor when he was greeted by a chorus of outraged and panicked voices. People were rushing from cubical to cubical, papers flying in the air, telephones ringing wildly. It was frantic and he could feel a tension in the air, as though a riot was about to break out.

"Sam fucking Blake!"

Sam was confronted by the corpulent form of Harriet Phillips one of his more unsavoury coworkers. Harriet was without question one of the most bitchy, spiteful, mean spirited people Sam had ever encountered. Perhaps it was because of how overweight she was, how garish her make up was applied, how ridiculous her brightly coloured clothing was, that this miserable excuse of a human being seemed to find delight in inconveniencing everyone she met. Slight typo on a report? Talk on the phone to a customer at octave above her liking? Coffee not hot enough? She had complaints ready for all of it. The woman was a quintessential Karen.

And she stood before him, rounded face flushed with exertion, red hair a mess, snarl drawn across her mouth. "What the fuck have you done you little prick!"

"What on earth are you talking about?" Sam replied, mildly confused. "I just got back. What's the rub?"

Harriet's expression went sour. "What's the rub?" She snatched a ruler from a nearby desk and jabbed him with it. "Don't play games with me! You said or did something to Vicky and now she's fucking made you her right hand and overturned all of our current projects till you sign off on them!" She jabbed him again, "and then you fuck off for a few hours while we're left to pick up the pieces you shit!"

She made to jab him again but Sam snatched the ruler from her hands.

"Harriet, what makes you think I have any fucking say over what Vicky does?" Of course, he knew exactly why their boss had acted so irrationally, but there was no need to tell the bitch any of that. "And I had a family emergency that called me away, so cool it. I'm here now, so I'll sort it all out."

"You'll sort it out?" The double-chinned face was progressively growing more feral with each passing second. "What the fuck could a washed up loser like you do? You've been working here for years and you've done jack shit with this job the whole time. You're a fuck up Sam, a loser, a fucking embarrassment who should have been booted from the company a long time ago!"

"Oh fuck off," while Sam couldn't exactly deny that he had no ambition or energy for his job beyond the bog standard required to keep him employed, Harriet's words had stung. "You think I'm a loser? A fat bitch like you would probably do anything to get a chance with someone like me!"

He was angry and hadn't even fully processed what he had just said before feeling that familiar sensation of vertigo. This time the effect was enough that he felt himself almost collapse before it passed.

Harriet was looking at him differently, rage and disgust replaced by concern and something else. Her small, squinty eyes glistened with unshed tears as she took in his weary form.

"Oh, oh Sam I am so, so sorry!" Her voice was choked with emotion, she reached out to touch his arm, her chubby fingers holding him desperately. " I was wrong to say all of that, I was...oh god, I was such a stupid, foolish bitch," she began to rub his arm, "I hope...I hope this hasn't changed the way you see me? Please, I can make things up to you. How about dinner at my place tonight?"

It took him a moment to fathom what the fuck was going on with this woman. But then he realised his words and what they meant for the cosmos. She was desperately in love with him now. Fuck, this would need correcting pronto. He opened his mouth to undo it when he felt another pair of hands grasp him and pull him away.

"Buddy?" It was Jerry, and was guiding Sam over to a corner cubical that was otherwise unoccupied. "What the fuck happened?"

Sam shook his head. "You tell me. I go away for a few and when I get back the office is a mess."

"Man, don't play dumb," Jerry eyed him off, "we all saw you go into Vicky's office. You come out, you leave, and then she announces to all of us that you're de facto co-boss. What the fuck happened in there?"

Sam considered for a moment about lying, or perhaps just changing Jerry to be unconcerned about everything going on. But he liked the guy, the knucklehead made work a little bit less miserable and he figured the whole godly power thing would be a lot more fun if he had someone else aware of it whenever he did something.

"What if I told you...I uh," fuck, how would he put it into words that were easily understood? Sam grasped in his mind for an answer. "So, what if I told you that I had the ability make any statement I verbalise into an objective truth?"

Jerry blinked. "What?"

"Um...ok," Sam tried again, "I think I have the ability to speak things out loud that change the fabric of reality."

Again, Jerry's face was one of puzzlement. "Buddy, if this is some kind of Star Trek reference, I'm not getting it."

Fuck. Maybe he needed to try a different method.

He scanned the office and saw Lisa, the mail girl. She was a mousy, quiet young woman who had just started a few months ago. Her glasses were pretty think and her brunette bangs looked like they had been cut by a child, but she was otherwise a very polite, inoffensive figure in the office.

"See Lisa over there?"

Jerry frowned "The little frumpy chick who's scared of everyone, yeah?"

"Ok," he tried to think of something outlandish enough that would prove his power. He could just change it back later. "she's actually a very well endowed futa."

The vertigo hit again, nearly doubling him over. When it cleared he looked over at Lisa, who was still going about her day, but with a significant bulge sticking out from her dark work pants. Jerry followed his gaze and then let his jaw drop as he took in the new information.

"Holy shit," he said, turning the information over in his head. He looked back at Sam in wonder. "How the fuck did you know she was packing heat? You see her jerking off in the break room or something?"

Christ. Jerry might have been Sam's best work friend, but the man was a fucking moron.

"No...fuck," Sam pitched the ridge of his nose and swallowed back his frustration, "ok another example," he looked at Dylan, a gay guy who had made it clear before that he thought Jerry was a dumb macho braggart and that Sam was a dickhead sidekick. Dylan glanced their way and shot a look of disapproval. "Dylan over there, you know what he thinks of us, right?"

Jerry nodded, smirking. "Yeah, the guy hates our guts. But so what if we make a few off colour jokes? It was the Christmas party and I was drunk! How was I supposed to know he wasn't one of them fun queers who were funny and shit? That prick complained to Vicky you know. Almost got me fired!"

Sam ignored his friend's bigotry for a moment and spoke. "Yeah, well he is actually our number one fan. Thinks we're greatest guys ever."

The vertigo hit again, and it was all Sam could do to contain the wave of nausea and pain it brought. The fuck was going on with his head? Was it getting worse?

They looked over and Dylan was no longer frowning, in fact he gave the two a big thumbs up.

Jerry laughed. "Fuck man, you're on a roll today!"

The pain in his head, the churning of his guts and the unbridled idiocy of his friend was too much. "FUCK!" He grabbed Jerry by the tie, "Jerry, you understand exactly what I'm trying to tell you!"

The sensation that hit him was so profoundly painful. It went beyond vertigo and into the realm of agony on a cellular level. His viscera squirmed inside of him, his vision blurred, his ears rang, gravity shifted from under him and suddenly unconsciousness took hold.

Sam couldn't say how long he was out for, but he was swimming through a void of absolute darkness. It was neither warm nor cold, and he was blessedly absent from any pain, just the pleasant sensation of floating. Distantly he heard a voice. A word. A name.

"Sam!"

His eyes cracked open. He was still in the cubical, with Jerry's face looking down at him in concern. The pain wasn't entirely gone, though he could feel it fading rapidly with each beat of his heart.

"Jesus, buddy," he said, helping Sam into a sitting position, "you gave me a scare for a second. One moment you were talking and then suddenly you're out like a light." He looked Sam over with greater scrutiny, "does that always happen when you do the...you know, magic shit?"

Thank God, the stupid bastard finally clicked with it. Sam said a silent prayer of thanks. He still felt nauseous, but he was getting his bearings back quickly enough. "It's not usually as bad as that," he rubbed his temple, trying to do away with the remnants of headache. "I don't get what that was all about...huh?"

His phone vibrated with a message. With clumsy fingers he dug it out and opened his inbox. He had received an email, which he promptly opened.

"Hello, Sam Blake.

Your twenty four hour free trial has expired, and as such you cannot effect any more changes to the universe. Thank you so much for trying our gift, if you'd like to look into signing up for an annual subscription please come to the coordinates attached below during the next full moon.

Regards, the Dev team."

Sam's eyes grew large as he read and reread the message. He looked about the office.

Oh, fuck.