Slum Enterprise - Chapter 7
CHAPTER 7
Very annoyed now, Lee, with his face red, went back to his desk. Joe always appointed Lee to do the enforcing since he didn't want to taint his "nice guy” persona with the employees. “Pretty much all smoke and mirrors," Lee thought.
This whole exchange made Lee second-guess why he stays around at this job. It paid the bills well and allowed him to travel and do late 20s-type things, but at what cost? Lee shakes the thought and goes back to his melancholy sandwich getting warmer at his desk. He sat awhile, which made his back sweaty; his body temperature was always elevated during medium-length conversations because Lee was always secretly trying extra hard to control his vocal cords and mouth movements in a slow, meticulous way that limited his stammering speech that had plagued him since he could talk. Don't even mention long interview-type conversations; the thought of those alone made Lee sweat with fear. It was exhausting trying to get through a day without a major slip-up. This would consist of an easy, slow flow of words, then a locking, gripping force would seize his mouth and freeze his brain.
No matter how hard he tried, he could not force out the word he was stuck on. There would be a long, strange pause between words. The recipient in the conversation would also find this strange in terms of normal cadence in modern English conversations. It seemed like the pause wasn't the correct stopping point of the sentence Lee was trying to complete. The recipient would make an uncomfortable body shift in the chair and smile awkwardly and be patient until the next word was stammered and forced with Lee's red face full of embarrassment. It was much worse in his childhood, likely the main reason the anxiety and dreaded kitchen attack occurred when it did.
He was in the beginning of inner-city middle school, which is notoriously known for the advanced ridicule of children with stammered speech. He was an easy target when the other kids found out while being forced to read a book paragraph out loud by the hungover substitute teacher. Lee would speak as slowly as he could, which the other kids thought was funny, and often stammer on simple words, which subconsciously interjected into the bullies' minds that “oh, this kid must be retarded.”
The kids in the back would interrupt the stammering speech and start the mocking process by stuttering and stammering on the same sentence he was on. Then, they would quickly finish the simple sentence for him and yell, “Today, you idiot." All the kids would laugh and point, and the teacher hunched over at the wooden desk would say, “Quiet down,” and secretly pity Lee but not help at the same time. The class was forced to let Lee finish the paragraph. He would be red and sweating a lot for a 12-year-old and then shove his face into his hand and lay his head down at his desk to hide the shame and embarrassment. In the halls after the bell rang, the bullies would run up and start to stutter at him and run off to drink copious amounts of 2% milk hidden in their lockers since their parents needed at least one athletic prodigy to get themselves out of poverty.
Lee would come home from school and run upstairs into his room and slam the door. At dinner his parents would ask questions about how his day was, and he would sit there and give “yes” or “no” answers. His parents knew of the verbal handicap; they have put him through rounds of speech therapy and special meetings with specialists at elementary school. While some of the coping methods helped, Lee always rejected them after barely even practicing the methods. Lee, deep down, knew that he would be the only one to figure a way out.
It took until college when he began to figure out his formulated methods to prevent major stammering attacks. At this point, the stammer now came in episodes; it reverted to phases, periods of struggle with stammering, and periods of easy flow and confidence that made him think that it was finally under control. By the time he got his first job and had established a decent 5-year career as an engineer and lab manager, the stammer was mostly a subconscious hidden artifact that would plague him at the most inopportune times. It was triggered by stress, of course, but Lee was very good at keeping it at bay.
“The Life System demands for the economy to be stimulated. Materialism is the key to happiness, right? Making money to pad the accounts, every American will work for big bank accounts and a house full of Chinese-manufactured goods. Not just the local American economy, but the globe is slowly falling deeper into the black hole of the Life System. Peace and prosperity can only last so long. The American dream has tainted the earth and pulled the soul away from the truth. What's worse, big screens and pocket screens push and shove unlimited options and data to your brain. Options, options, options. Options for travel, options for cars, options for houses and neighborhoods, options for clothes, options for food, options for computers, options for pocket screens, options for nightly entertainment, options for socially acceptable hobbies, options for how to act, and options for how to think. The expanse of options is too much for the common mind to fully comprehend and categorize. In effect, it makes most screen viewers crazy or incel after a solid year. They completely surrender against the dopamine surges of instant gratification with the thrill of finding that one specific niche online video or blog post that's so particular it makes you question if the FBI truly isn't reading your mind while you sleep.”
Lee thought to himself in silence. He tore his back from the sticky chair. The glass door of Joe's office was shut with another poor soul getting the same treatment (it was Murphy Oxley). The tower was back on watch. The sandwich in Lee's stomach started to make him tired due to the blood rushing to his stomach for digestion. The office started to shoot intense beams of blinding white light. The office glass viewing wall and door acted as a magnifying lens. It shot rays into the cubicle laid before its border. The techs and lab engineers sat in their cubes and stared at the light. It became a symbol of blind faith. Lee ducked for cover and wanted to wait out the anomalous event. Place your faith in the glass tower; maybe one day, after trials and tribulations that prove your worth to the people in charge, you too will be able to sit on the tower throne. It will only take 20 to 40 years.
In the afternoon, the day was winding down, and Lee had a break from meetings for the rest of the workday. Lee turned the swivel chair around to look at his hanging calendar pinned to the grey felt cubicle wall.
“Shit,” he said.
The department picnic was at 3pm. It happened once a year, a celebration put on by the department director and VPs as a way of saying, “Thank you for allowing us to exploit you without the team unionizing; instead of bonuses this year, have some shitty cooked burgers and brats instead with a little cooler full of the cheap light beer placed on the ground next to the rusty public park grills.”
Lee knew all the senior managers and directors would be there. The exec levels would mingle with the low-titled cogs. They put on a show of great care and understanding with the common man. As the cogs would initiate conversations to hopefully get a leg up in next quarter's promotional talks, the execs would listen, nod their big heads, and form beautiful sentences to soothe them.
“They must be heard, they must be validated, but under no circumstance promise them anything in terms of career progression; that's only for us.” The execs would blurt out loud, practiced laughs at the large round table during the monthly executive leadership training with hired guest speakers that present on “How to Look and Act Poor to Blend in While Enjoying a Night Out in the Town."
The presenter would divert the topic back to connecting with the blue-collar work. They would say, “If the employee feels that they are valued for their work, productivity and efficiency stabilize…hell, it might even improve without the need for yearly merit increases. The shareholders insist that we practice and try to mingle more with the low levels. Just think, the more blind conformity and exposure to the pure bliss of being an exec, the harder the low levels work and produce. Of course the pathway to the top is filled in with giant cement walls, but it's our job to paint the walls with realistic murals of landscapes with a well-flattened gravel road that they can walk if they have the balls and intellect to take calculated risks at the opportune moments. I'm having a great time…”
“Oh, what fucking bullshit, how the hell did I blank this?” Lee said. Stan was typing away at a report in the next-door cube and gave a short sniffle laugh. Lee had a problem with his sailor vocabulary. It was deemed improper and extremely offensive by HR. A few months ago there was an incident that made Lee nervous about his uncontrollable explicit outbursts. He was in an online meeting with Joe and Murphy (the other Liquid Lab Manager). Murphy, a 53-year-old navy career man, had been with the company for 12 years. Short with deep black hair with not even a hint of gray (Lee wasn't sure if he dyed it) and an avid smoker with a huge round gut that hung over his thick leather belt was a decent enough person. Overall, Lee liked Murphy. Over the years they built a good enough working relationship. Murphy was always accepting of Lee's unorthodox opinions and always cut through the corporate bullshit sent his way from Joe Fisher or any other exec.
A recent meeting with the trio (Lee, Joe, and Murphy) revealed the unscalable wall they both faced against the corporate regime. During this meeting, Joe was on another tirade of policy updates and expressed that he was unhappy with the time the techs seemed to take. It was a change to yet another safety procedure called "Confined Space”.
“All the lab test benches have Plexiglas or steel bomb shelter-type enclosures in case a test article were to explode inside from pressure spikes. When the techs need to swap out hydraulic setups or go into the enclosures for maintenance purposes, the safety committee found at the last walkthrough that there is a significant chance of the tech becoming entrapped and suffocated from hazardous fluid fumes. Safety has addressed their concerns and has implemented the “Confined Space” program for the lab.” Joe went on to explain the entire program in grand detail.
Lee and Murphy, sitting across the desk from Joe in his glass watchtower office, held on for dear life not to pass out from the onrush of over-explanation. The air was stale from the cycle of CO₂ conversion from three sets of lungs in the small room volume. It smelled slightly of body odor and dread. All they could do was bunker down and hold a wicked smile of “Yes sir, may I have some more?” Joe was on the ball today. Lee noticed Joe’s gut was flabbing in the void and his cheeks had more ripples from jaw tendon movements.
Confined space was a common construction safety practice, usually when dealing with sewers, larger tankers, or just tight, cave-like crawl spaces where a person's entire body needed to be wedged through to perform some type of work of a mechanical or electrical repair nature. The risk of becoming trapped was high in the aforementioned cases; there were extra precautions taken by OSHA to ensure the safety of the entrant.
Green Earth Solutions policy mirrored the OSHA practices. To get started, there had to be another “certified” confined space master that would review and personally check the tight workspace and jot anything down in their little printed laminated booklet. The main object was to note any “booby traps” and dismantle them before some poor soul crawled in.
They were also equipped with a calibrated air sensor that tested CO₂, methane, and oxygen levels. After the air was confirmed breathable, the master would transfer the sensor to the entrant and let him go on his way. They would wait behind and monitor the air sensor readings from a handheld device; if any limit was reached, the sensor would alarm, and the master would spring into action and pull the person out.
While this all made sense in the tight-space construction environments, it made zero sense for the lab to introduce. A body would never be able to be fully immersed inside a bench without the help from a mafia hit team with saw-alls and canisters of undiluted bleach. The back of the benches was a web of analytical sensors and hydraulic circuits.
“Lee… Murphy and questions?” They both shook their heads east to west. “Let's do a little quiz, shall we?” Joe used his big shoes to push himself away from the desk and roll to the oversized whiteboard on the right-hand wall. Joe catapulted up and tucked both legs under him on the seat of the chair, he looked like a school girl trying to cover their bare legs with the dress code plaid skirt that was too short. He began to write down all the important talking points and slapped his hand on the whiteboard, signaling to the class that they needed to stop daydreaming and looking out the window.
The tension was building in Lee and Murphy. Not a word was spoken between them; they allowed Joe to rant and rave at the whiteboard. Lee felt something bubble up from deep within his iceberg.
“I really need to make sure, bringing this darn thing home, that the two of you understand the process.” Joe said. “If an employee dies from suffocation, the paperwork will be grueling. You don't want that now, do you?” At this point the tone of voice Joe had embarked on was piercing the soul of Lee. He saw a small eye twitch occur on Murphy's round face. His leg was bouncing up and down on the ball of his right foot. Joe went on.
“We are all here to ensure the safety of all direct reports. Training for certification will be scheduled next week. Keep a lookout for it in your inboxes… I can see by your faces that you aren't happy about the additional pre-procedural paperwork you need to check and sign before allowing any worker to enter a space. This is by design!” Joe said. He used the fulcrum angle of his knee joint to act like a spring in the office chair; he looked like a jack-in-the-box clown just sprung from its cage.
“And, by design, I mean it’s meant to slow us down. Safety does not involve speed; it requires slow and meticulous investigations of the subject. It's really quite sinister, the gremlins that roam the internals of the test bench's spider web of metallic surfaces…Boo!”
Joe leaped up from the chair and raised his arms in the air and made claw-like shapes with his fingers. He forgot he wasn't talking to his daughters for a split second. Lee didn't flinch, and Murphy began chewing the left side of his cheek and licked his lips rapidly. The body odor smell amplified as Joe's underarms exposed stains on his checkered business shirt.
“Thinking deeply is critical; the only way to think deeply is slowly. Here, I have labeled re-purposed pee cups I swiped from my doctor's visit.” Joe went over to his filing cabinet and pulled two small plastic cups with blue lids from the bottom drawer and placed them in front of Lee and Murphy. “While you think with ferocious intent on the problem at hand, use these little cups in case you don't want to break the flow of thought by getting up to go to the bathroom. Make sure to wear pants with spacious enough flies or hang your appendage out in the free-spirited air so you don't even have to bother with it. Spray and pray”
Lee entered a fever dream, and Murphy began to crack his knuckles without end in sight.
“We must observe everything the techs do, all the time, and stop the projects; safety needs to control all. I…I just can't have an unsafe environment. I'm fully confident that taking time to slow the roll—don't worry, I have never smoked,” Joe winked, “if you know what I mean…—use the previously discussed Stop Work Authority Dance to pinpoint and locate potential threats before the disaster occurs. The motion sensors on the support beams will detect subnormal moment velocities and sound the alarm. Then, slow down again and fill out the pre-paperwork. After the task is completed, fill out the on-the-job paperwork. Then submit it back to the safety lead and fill out the post paperwork, then complete the satisfaction survey on your experience. Remember, it's all anonymous. Murphy, please calm down. I know this is all so delightful. Lee, please hold Murphy's legs down; they are shaking the desk. As I was saying, the pre, on-the-job, post, survey paperwork will be “packetized” and reviewed during the next safety committee biweekly meeting. Here's hoping that the packet will allow for more safety meetings to discuss improvement projects. It's all such a great mental exercise; it keeps us managers on our toes, it refines our edge, and it keeps the cataracts at bay. Lee, Murphy… I can tell that you are speechless; please nod yes if you are still with me.”
Lee and Murphy both nod while Lee is leaning over Murphy's legs, applying downforce onto his kneecaps. If someone were to pass the glass wall, they would see a funny Renaissance painting of a man giving oral pleasure while an excited onlooker jumps in the air with a mad expression of some sort. Lee felt like he had 1000 knives stabbing at all areas of his body; something was about to break.
“Great, okay, that is all.” Joe said.
This was the signal to leave; it was to be expected that Joe had exhausted himself too. The strung-out lab managers of the Green Earth Solutions Liquid Lab leave the office and sort back to their respective desks. Joe follows them out and leaves right away for another meeting somewhere over in a different building. Lee sits back down and is on the verge of a mental breakdown; the endless nail-biting info dump and condescending way Joe delivered it drove him to the brink. Lee couldn't remember exactly, but Joe went through the same topics five times.
Lee used to talk a lot; over the years he began to realize that every boss he had and every peer and cog always kept tabs. He was always confused about why everyone in the halls always carried little black notebooks. It was like an unwritten item that was required, but no one actually told you that you needed to have it.
The notebook was to keep tabs on everyone else. They would track common phrases, hand gestures, and factual history they overheard in conversations or directly heard themselves. Lee didn't know what these ‘notes’ were used for. Once he found one lying next to an unoccupied printer. He quickly flipped the pages and saw decorated pages of employees names with bullet points filled with tidbits of personal information.
Since then, Lee tried to talk very little and was very cautious about exposing anything about his personal life, even as simple as what toothbrush brand he was enjoying.
Unknown to Lee, the raw tabs were collected yearly by hiding them as purchase card transaction statements and sent to a basement retro filing cabinet. It had every employee's likes, dislikes, personality traits, medical history, work ethics, philosophies, obedience metrics, etc. The execs then report to the board and shareholders on the health of the employee psyche as a whole. The health of the company was never about the total fiscal sales and gross margins; it's about the grip around the human mental attitude that dwells in the grey and green halls of Green Earth Solutions. The execs had to get a carefully metered siphon rate on the employees soul and passion. If they sucked too fast, there would be mass resistance; too slow, then not enough control and profit. Having the correct amount per year was most important for corporate longevity. It was the long game.
Lee’s monitors are dark; he can see his hazy, blurry reflection from the dark matte of the planar surface. He leans his head back over the chair rest, lets in a deep breath, and screams, “FUCK.”
The scream shot through the halls; employees bound at their desks pulled their heads up over the cubicle walls. The faces look over at Lee; they have wide eyes of offense written over them. Lee’s honest projection of human emotion was not an acceptable business practice.
Next, managers with sliding glass doors slam them open so hard that the damper doesn't have enough time to counteract the force. They looked very concerned for the safety and well-being of the man who screamed. They shake their heads in disapproval and start to flip through the filing cabinet to find the necessary paperwork for an incident such as this.
Lee knows that he is screwed. He never meant for the scream to be that loud. It was just the unrelentingness of Joe that boiled up his fever to the vapor point. In order to save his own head from spontaneous combustion, he needed to vent the pressure in a flash of vocal anxiety and cortisol hormones. He had to release something truly human, a primal call to the ancestors of the ancient world: “Why, oh why must I suffer from a foible, chief?” The ancestors don't answer; they only watch from the graves, spinning counterclockwise uncontrollably, watching the effects of the Life System.
The cortisol hormone was thick in the air like LA smog. The onlookers began to drop one by one like a game of whack-a-mole. Lee could see the grayish cloud of hormonal byproduct he produced drifting up into the office air, going towards the HVAC intake ducts to the west of him.
Near the duct, a green support pillar equipped with a special air quality sensor right under the fire alarm. Lee had forgotten that a construction crew had recently worked on the pillar fire alarms; when they finished, there was a small black box with thin vents and a blinking red light. Lee thought it must have been another OSHA-required sensor to monitor the office air quality.
Lee stood and looked over to see Murphy in the same comatose state; he looked defeated. They locked eyes momentarily, and Murphy suggested that Lee sit back down in an ergonomic position and stay put.
“Make sure to move your desk right to the cube wall and sit in the center of the floor space.” Murphy said.
“Why?” Lee responded, it was a very specific task.
“You remember the fire alarm crew? That smog of hormones you emitted is slowly heading in the direction of that black box.”
“Murphy, I'm sorry; my outburst was over the top. Please forgive me. Joe was under my skin, and I had to hold it together to stop you from vibrating away.” Lee said.
Murphy did not say anything; he started to organize his desk and pushed the desk to the wall and centered himself to wait.
Lee helplessly watched the smog float over to the sensor. The smog was sucked in between the little black box vents.
“RING, RING, RING.” The alarms go off. It was different from the sharp buzz of a standard fire alarm. It had a police-like cadence and tone. The office lights dimmed and turned a deep red, like a photographer's darkroom. In a quick, loud “BOOM,” secret trapdoors blew all throughout the office floor. Giant metal grates with ½ bars dropped from ceiling trapdoors, covering all the windows and exits.
“What the hell is this…Murphy?” Lee screamed over the alarm siren.
“I thought Stan told you, as part of the alarm safety initiative, stress hormone sensors were installed.” Murphy yelled back, white knuckling the arms of his chair.
“Why the hell would they need that?” Lee covered his ears.
All Lee could do now was watch as the events unfolded. Nobody else in the office scattered; everyone seemed to know the procedure. "When did I miss the memo?" Lee thought. He mimicked the other employees and sat still in the office chair, feet flat on the ground and spine straight.
Then, a giant trapdoor over the center of the office floor blew around the seams, expelling dust and plaster into the air. In a fast, jolting shift, the trapdoor slid open to one side, revealing a bright white light. All Lee could see was the formation of black figures in the backdrop. It exposed a secret operation.
Above the main office floor in which he worked was an entire hidden floor filled with control terminals and tape reel computers equipped with a giant 1960s light bulb screen that had the office floor plans of every building. Each light bulb was positioned within a cubicle, letting the controller know whether the employee was in or out. Think of a big war room full of stressed-out, thin, black-tied men trying to win the war on communism.
The black silhouette figures begin to take shape as the dust and smoke clear. There were 5 men in SWAT attire: helmets and gas masks, black bulletproof vests, commando pants with many pockets, and tactical boots. All black.
They held semi-automatic ARs with laser pointers. All 5 simultaneously looked in Lee's direction; the goggled eyes scared him immensely. Then, Lee was blinded a bit by the red laser they were pointing at his head and face. One of the SWAT members pulls a heavy climbing rope and drops it through the ceiling door. It lands on a table of freshly made coffee, sending the small Styrofoam cups flying.
“HR SWAT,” Murphy yells. The HR SWAT climb down the rope chanting “HUT HUT HUT HUT HUT HUT.” They slither and fall onto the grey carpet, stepping over spilled cups of coffee. To Lee, it looks like the SWAT is trained and means business.
After work hours, the HR SWAT conducts drills; the trapdoor rope climb was one of the many check boxes required to pass before an official job offer could be made.
Now, on ground level, the five unstrap from the climbing belts and dash towards Lee's cube. Lee is grabbed from his cubicle walkway and thrown onto the ground. He can taste the carpet.
Two SWAT HR officers start to hogtie him; when they finish, Lee’s legs are in the air, bent with his hands behind his back. He felt the knee pads dig into his back and quickly positioned his head so that his right cheek was pressed up against the floor. He saw the three other SWAT grab and try to take hold of Murphy.
All Lee wanted to do was go home and see his wife. One of them began to speak in a dark, low, muffled voice.
“Lee Collins, you have violated employee handbook code 14.78 dash A.” The SWAT said in a monotone, robotic voice.
What do you mean, employee handbook?” Lee said, struggling to maintain air in his lungs from the knee force on the back of his chest. “The company never gave me a handbook when I started; I don't even know what that code is.”
“It is the responsibility of the employee upon hire date to ask the correct questions to their assigned trainer.” The SWAT said.
Lee’s floor altercation was short-lived. Murphy gave the 3 SWAT trying to grab hold of the slip and juke. Murphy's flabby body rippled violently underneath his clothes as he shoved past. Lee didn't know he could move that fast. He could only see the frantic feet of Murphy running and the black boots following out to the main hallway. Murphy made the dash to the south exit and started to pry on the steel bars, but in the end it proved a waste of time. The HR SWAT came from an elite Harvard University program in which it was required that you had to have been in the top 100 of national cross-country athletes. The SWAT caught up in record 100-meter dash time in full tactical gear, and the linebacker sacked Murphy to the ground and hog-tied him.
Lee and Murphy were swiftly strapped up in climbing jock hoists and were cranked up by a large metal ratcheting system and crane hanging above the trapdoor hole. They ascended into the light to start HR behavioral conditioning.
It takes a few minutes to adjust to the bright lights and surroundings. Everything in the HR SWAT Control Center was white besides the old-school computer recruitment churning out binary number sets and algorithms to check the potency of the newest company communication email on new cafeteria options that would be most effective in triggering salivation.
The wall over the giant office map (with little bulbs) had the HR SWAT values written in bold green lettering. “Respect, Integrity, and Commitment".
The statement also paralleled the company values recited before the start of every major company meeting. The SWAT loaded both the lab managers on gurneys and strapped them in with the leather on the outside and fuzzy felt on the inside restraints.
The SWAT wheeled them down to a set of numbered rooms specially used for the conditioning program. Lee went into room 3, and Murphy went into room 4. The room is pure grey with nothing in it. A single light bulb hangs from a cord in the center of the ceiling. A dentist's chair is dragged in and positioned near the back of the room by the metal door. The room even smells like a dentist's office, sterile with a hint of fluoride. The HR SWAT unstraps him, lifts him from the gurney, slams him down onto the dentist chair, and restraps him in. Next, a large projector is rolled on a clean stainless-steel cart.
The project bulb hangs over Lee's head, pointed at the bare gray wall in front of him. The single light bulb is switched off, and the projector is kicked to life. The room glows from the black and white film.
It starts with cheesy music and an image of the old company logo with the title, “Welcome to the beginning of the new you.” What follows is the classic brainwashing instructional video Lee came to suspect.