"Stand up and stop the chicken impersonation, you look ridiculous" Amanda ordered Lily.
"Thank you Amanda!" Lily seemed relieved as she stood back up. Acting like poultry had been highly embarassing and undermining both professionally and personally of course, but at least Amanda wasn't planning on abusing her further. Unless..
"Be quiet. You won't speak unless I say you can" Amanda admonished her colleague with a stern look in her eye "Do you understand?"
A suddenly dumbstruck Lily nodded anxiously.
"Good, now we are going to play a game. It is called 'Truth and Punishment'" she continued as Dr Darke watched, fascinated where this was going "from now on you will need to answer any question I ask you completely truthfully, whether you want to or not. If I don't like an answer you give me you will be punished in a humiliating and degrading way. The extent of the punishment will be determined by how much I dislike your answer. Is that clear?"
Lily nodded anxiously, not liking the sound of this at all.
"Okay, so my first question is why you are accompanying me on this interview?" Amanda asked accusingly. This was clearly something that had been bothering her.
"I suggested to the editor that I should" Lily admitted.
"How come?"
Lily took a deep breath, knowing this wasn't going to end well for her.
"Because you aren't all that good of reporter. I wanted to make sure it went well."
"And take the credit for any success the article gets?" Amanda suggested with a sneer.
"Yes" Lily sighed.
"Well, it might not surprise you to learn I didn't like those answers at all, Lily. In fact I hated them" Amanda was struggling to remain calm but her fury was palpable "Now I just have to decide what on appropriate punishment."
Dr Darke watched on gleefully. The only thing that could have made this any better would have been a large bag of popcorn.
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