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Chapter 3 by magellanilabink magellanilabink

What do you respond?

Responding to the call

"IT? I'm here about the call?" you say hesitantly and hold up your ID card. Was this the right room? The voice on the phone sounded like her.

She rolls her eyes and sighs, like she's doing you a huge favor by even talking to you.

"Over there" she points to her desk, then turns away from you while taking the headset. She picks up a conversation you presumably interrupted. "I'm back. No, just maintenance, you know how they are. Mmhm, I hear you".

You stand in the doorway for a second. You're used to being treated poorly here, but this is over the top. She called you! You rushed over here before you even made it to your office! You don't even know what she wants you to fix!

Swallowing your pride and dignity, you walk over to her desk. There's a laptop on one end, a charging stand for her mobile, a little container filled with business cards, various knickknacks. You look over at her, but she's still facing away from you, engrossed in the call. On a whim, you reach over and grab a few of her business cards, stuffing them in your backpack.

With no further direction, you sit down in her chair with a small creak, and pull the laptop over to you. Opening it, you see the regular company lockscreen, but you have admin access so you just enter a recovery mode.

While you're tapping away, you suddenly hear her shriek right next to you "WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING?!"

You look up, startled, and reflexively take your hands off the keyboard.

"What? What? What did I do?", you stammer.

"What the fuck are you doing hacking my computer you creep?!"

"Hacking?! What, no, I was trying to see what was wrong with it!"

"Who told you to touch that?! There's nothing wrong with my fucking computer!"

A bit of indignation is starting to make its way through your panic. "Well why did you call me here then? What am I supposed to fix?"

"This!" she pushes you back in the chair, rocking you back and making a small creaking noise again.

"The chair?!" you ask, "I'm IT, not custodial!"

"I genuinely don't give a fuck what you think you are" she says, leaning forward, "You fix my fucking chair right the fuck now, and then I am reporting your creeping ass to HR"

You're stunned. And terrified. You know HR won't give a shit what the truth of this situation is, they tend to resolve conflicts by just relocating or getting rid of whomever is the easiest to replace and will cause the least trouble. You don't love this job, but it pays well enough and is pretty comfortable when you don't have to talk to these assholes. Your only hope is to try and make her happy and hope she's bluffing.

"Uhm, yeah. Sure, I mean, yes, of course, I'll help you however I can"

"Whatever" she says and turns around.

You take a few quick breaths, then look at the chair. It's one of those super-ergonomic things that cost more than a cheap car. The underside is bristling with levers and settings. You have no idea how this works.

The only thing you can think of is the can of WD40 you have in your backpack. "I hope this thing won't melt" you think as you open your pack and reach in.

Your hand touches something vaguely plastic. The QEBP! You had completely forgotten about it! Right, you're not just mild mannered IT Tech Richard Smith, you're the owner of the Quantum Entanglement Body Pillow! People can't push you around like they used to!

An idea starts to take form in your head. You take out the QEBP and say "Miss Holdenbuch? Could you please hold this?", and when she turns around you toss it to her.

She yelps in surprise, but instinctively catches the ball with both hands. "What the fuck?!" she exclaims, and drops it on the floor. "What the fuck was that?!"

"Oh it's just my stress ball" you say as you bend down and make a show of applying the WD40 to what you assume are the right areas. "You seemed tense so I figured I'd lend it to you"

"You! You fucking!", she clenches her hands and kicks the QEBP over to you "Take your disgusting fleshy ball and get the fuck out off my office, right the fuck now!"

You grab the ball and place it back in your bag with the WD40 and hurry over to the door.

"You're fucking through here, asshole, you hear me? I'll have you out before end of week. Fucking useless creep"

Where to next?

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