Company

by Max Barry

  Jones clenches his fists. He has always considered himself to be a peaceful person, so he is unprepared for the violence of his reaction. He wants to get out of the car and hit her so badly that he can taste it in the back of his throat.

  “You,” Eve says, “should think really carefully about whether you want to be another Harvey Millpacker.”

  “Go,” Jones says to the driver, and when this elicits no action, he roars: “Drive!” But the cab doesn't move until Eve takes her hand off the door and steps away. Jones doesn't even get to leave until she approves, and, bottom line, he guesses that's about right.

  On level 2 of the Zephyr building, Senior Management sits around the board table. It's been a long day for Senior Management. There's no rest for the executive. With darkness outside the floor-to-ceiling windows and a thunderstorm brewing, Senior Management puts the final touches on the consolidation plan.

  There are two ways to look at Senior Management. One is that it's a tightly integrated team tirelessly pulling together in the service of whatever's best for the company. The other is that it's a dog pack of power-hungry egomaniacs who occasionally assist Zephyr as a side effect of their individual campaigns for wealth and status. Nobody believes the tightly knit team theory anymore. Once, a long time ago, it may have been true, but the instant a dog-pack person made it into Senior Management, it was all over. It's like a fox getting into the chicken house; pretty soon there are only foxes and feathers. If Senior Management was ever made up of selfless individuals who put teamwork ahead of self-interest—and this is a big if—they were long ago torn to pieces.

  It's important to understand this, because it's a prerequisite to making sense of Senior Management decisions, like the consolidation. The initial goal was to streamline Zephyr's business operations. But that was a week ago. Since then, it has been about empire expansion. Senior Management camps have waged fierce and bloody war. Departments were lost, claimed, and lost again. Many fine, decent ideas were lost in the mayhem; many innocent, hardworking employees, none of whom know it yet, were caught in the cross fire. It has been a week of senseless tragedy and mindless destruction, and now even Senior Management is a little tired of it.

  But at last it's over. The final plan, which gives every employee something to be happy about, so long as they work in Senior Management, reduces the number of Zephyr departments by a whopping 70 percent. Many departments are out entirely, but most were rolled together, creating new departments with all of the responsibilities and some of the resources of two. Or three. Or, in one case, five. The plan is passed around the table, and as each Senior Management signature is added, hideous new creatures are formed from the stitching together of departmental organs. With the slash of a pen, Security is grafted onto Human Resources. Large, flapping sections of Legal are sewn into place. For reasons that have nothing to do with operating efficiency and everything to do with hardball bargaining between executives, the sole remaining Credit employee is stapled on. Lightning crashes outside the boardroom window as Senior Management finally, exhaustedly, attaches a departmental head. And there it is: a new department. Senior Management has given birth, right there in the boardroom. Its progeny lies on the table, a cruel abomination of nature, sucking in its first foul breath. Its yellow eyes glint balefully. Its limbs curl and flop on the polished oak. It throws back its ill-fitting head and roars with life, or something similar.

  Below, the scattered few employees still at work pause and look up. Their bowels tighten. They exchange frightened looks. No one puts it into words, but everyone feels it. Something evil has come into the world.

  Q4/2: NOVEMBER

  GRETEL MONADNOCK carefully slides her Kia hatchback into a space right beside the elevators. She turns off the engine, gathers her jacket and bag, and closes the door behind her. The sound rolls up the length of the Zephyr Holdings underground parking lot and back. Usually Gretel drives right through this sublevel, passing car after car; she only keeps half an eye out for a space, and if she finds one it's a real thrill. But today a mere half a dozen or so cars occupy spaces. It feels strange. It is 7:25 A.M.

  She is inside the elevator and pushing for the lobby when her cell phone trills. She digs it out of her bag. “Hello?”

  “Hi Gretel, it's Pat again. Is everything still on track?”

  “I've just arrived this second.”

  “Oh, great. Thanks so much, Gretel. You'll call me if you have any questions?”

  “I will. Bye.” Gretel turns off her phone. The elevator doors open and suddenly Gretel is looking at a young man in a blue Security uniform. He is standing directly in front of her, blocking her exit from the elevator. Behind him are two more uniformed men.

  The man's eyes drop to her chest, in a way that Gretel always finds disconcerting, to read her ID tag. “You're the receptionist?”

  “Yes.”

  “Right on time.” He smiles, which is clearly meant to be reassuring, but his lips are wet and shiny and Gretel feels a brush of irrational fear. “There are complete instructions in your voice mail, I'm told.”

  He steps aside. This allows her to see that there are three more Security personnel by the lobby's front doors and a further six encircle the reception desk.

  She puts her head down and walks to her desk. The clacking of her heels echoes crazily. Nobody else makes a sound; they simply follow her with their eyes. When she reaches her desk, she realizes she is holding her breath.

  Six stapled pages are waiting for her and her voice-mail light is blinking. She picks up the handset.

  “Hi, Gretel. This is Pat from upstairs. I've got a message from Senior Management following. Someone should have called you at home over the weekend about this, but if you have any questions, I'll be in early Monday, too. Just give me a call. Thanks. Click. Pat, forward this on to that woman in reception—sorry, I forget her name. Not Eve Jantiss, the other one. HR has told her to come in early Monday morning, but can you make sure she does? Just keep calling her. Harrumph. All right. To reception: We have completed our consolidation plan, and as a result many employees have been reassigned to new departments. Other employees are no longer required. For security purposes, those people cannot be allowed to go to their desks. Security will disable direct elevator access from the parking lot to the upper floors, so everyone will come in via the lobby. As people arrive, you need to check them against the new employee list, and if they've been terminated, explain to them that . . . well, just explain it. You can say that HR will be in contact to forward their severance pay, personal belongings, et cetera et cetera. Then ask them to leave the building. Security will be on hand to provide assistance. Any kind of assistance. Thanks.”

  Gretel puts down the phone. While she was listening, the Security guard with the wet lips came over to stand beside her. He smiles. “So, everything clear?”

  The first arrives just before eight: a middle-aged man in a suit with shiny knees and a baggy backside. He comes in through the front doors and begins to cross the lobby floor, glancing curiously at Security. Gretel freezes: she thought the guards were going to stop people, but apparently they expect her to. By the time she has unstuck her throat, the man is stepping into an open elevator and reaching for the button panel. Then his face blanches. He throws the nearest Security guard an anxious look. “Where's my floor?”

  The guard jerks his head toward Gretel. For a moment the man's expression doesn't change. Then his shoulders sag. It's a moment or two before he can bring himself to leave the elevator and cross the lobby floor, and when he does, his shoes drag. He doesn't walk so much as slide to the reception desk, and when he reaches it, his eyes don't meet Gretel's; instead, they fix on a random point on the desk's orange surface. “I'm from Central Accounting. Is . . . Central Accounting still here?”

  Gretel scans her pages. “Central Accounting has been consolidated into Treasury. The new department will operate from level 8.” She looks up. “Many Central Accounting staff have been terminated.”

  Th
e man tries to say it offhand, but it doesn't come out that way. “Have I been terminated?”

  “Are you Frank Posterman?”

  His eyes jump to her face. “No! Frank's the manager.”

  “Then yes.”

  His head rocks back. Gretel bleeds for him. But she keeps her face emotionless.

  “I'm sorry.” Already two Security guards are moving forward. Gretel reaches across the expanse of the desk and offers him her hand. “You need to leave the building now. Thank you for your service to Zephyr Holdings, and good-bye.”

  “She's good,” Klausman says, watching the monitor. “Compassionate, but professional. She won't do anything to help you, but you feel like she cares. That's exactly the kind of attitude that dampens emotional outbursts. Mona, make a note.”

  The entire Project Alpha team is clustered behind him. This is today's morning meeting, relocated to the monitoring room so they can watch the action. Occasionally a tech in jeans and a T-shirt squeezes between them to fool with a keyboard, but otherwise the room's atmosphere is highly compressed Calvin Klein and Chanel No. 5. Blake stands behind Klausman's right shoulder and Eve his left; Jones is behind her. So far their conversation has consisted of “Good morning,” “Big day today,” and “Yes,” but from the way her eyes keep flicking to him, Eve couldn't be any more aware of Jones if he was carrying a meat cleaver. Blake has picked up on this; during his and Eve's frigid exchange, Jones felt his steely blue gaze—or, at least, the half of it that isn't hidden beneath a black matte patch adorned with tiny letters that spell out Armani.

  “Look at level 2,” someone murmurs. All eyes leap to the monitor in the top corner. There Senior Management sits around a board table, their hands folded, their expressions somber. A speakerphone sits in the center of the table.

  “They're getting updates from Security in the lobby,” Eve says. She is wearing a strappy green dress. Her brown shoulders gleam at Jones.

  “Well, thus far, I have to say I'm impressed.” Klausman turns around for a second to see if anyone disagrees. The agents nod and murmur assent, except for Jones, who doesn't do anything at all. “They've followed the Omega recommendations protocol to the letter. Maybe a little overkill on the number of security guards, but better safe than sorry, eh? I remember a few years ago when Zephyr outsourced IT—not for the first or last time, of course”—chuckles from the agents; Eve's bare shoulders jiggle—“but the department manager, idiot that he was, told staff ahead of time. He actually called a meeting, announced it was everyone's last week, offered counseling, et cetera, et cetera, then sent them back to their desks. An hour later the phone system was down, company confidential files were on the public Web site, and when you tried to log on to your PC, you got a picture of a man doing something with a stapler that haunts me to this day. It took weeks to straighten out.”

  “The thing that concerns me,” Blake says, when everyone has finished enjoying this little story, “is not the execution, but the strategy. Senior Management knows what it's doing, but it's hardly given any thought to why. Basically, they just jumped at the chance to reorganize.”

  Klausman sighs and turns back to study the monitor. “True. Eve?”

  “Ah . . . well, it's a Drifting Goals systems archetype. Same problem we always have with Senior Management.”

  “Jones!” Klausman barks over his shoulder. “Do you know what she's talking about?”

  “I can guess.”

  “Go ahead.”

  “The primary benefits of a position in Senior Management are increased status and increased salary. The disadvantages are decreased free time and increased stress. So, logically, the sort of people who end up working in Senior Management are those who are most motivated by money and status, and care least about missing time with friends and family.”

  Klausman chuckles. “A somewhat unsympathetic view, Mr. Jones, but yes, you have the general idea.”

  “We seem to be taking a fairly unsympathetic view toward employees currently being fired,” Jones says. “I thought that's what we were doing.”

  Klausman, Eve, and Blake all turn around.

  Into the awkward silence, Eve says, “Well, he's got a point. Senior Management is no different from any other department, for our purposes. I know we all feel a connection to the top execs—and hell, Blake's in Senior Management—but we shouldn't be identifying with anybody. We're objective researchers.”

  Klausman nods slowly. “Indeed. Indeed. Fair point, both of you. And note, everyone, how valuable a fresh perspective is in identifying areas of potential groupthink.”

  He turns back. After a second, so do Blake and Eve. Everyone around Jones looks thoughtful. Jones feels thoughtful, too, but not about Senior Management. He wonders why all of a sudden Eve is crawling up his butt.

  Freddy arrives at Zephyr at eight thirty and his heart just about stops. A mass of people is milling inside the lobby. More alarmingly, a large group is gathered outside on the plaza, and blue-uniformed Security guards are progressively transferring people from the former to the latter. Freddy realizes it has happened. Zephyr Holdings has consolidated.

  He forges blindly through the crowd toward the reception desk. Dozens of employees are trying to do the same thing, and it's hot with the press of anxious bodies. When he gets one hand on the smooth surface of the desk, he hangs on to it with all his strength.

  Security, arranged around the desk, eyes the crowd with silent hostility. A guard looks at Freddy as if he is not positive that Freddy has been fired, but it wouldn't surprise him. Freddy feels terror bubble in his gut. On his left, a willowy female graduate trembles uncontrollably. A middle-aged man sweats into overalls on his right. One by one, they come before Gretel—not Eve; Eve is nowhere to be seen, which Freddy finds alarming all by itself—and are told they are no longer employed. There is no break, no respite: it is an uninterrupted stream of firings. With each one, the crowd groans as a single animal. By the time it's Freddy's turn, he has to fight the urge to flee before they can sack him.

  Gretel's eyes move onto him. Freddy is shocked to see compassion in them. Sympathy in this cattle yard is so unexpected that it gets under his guard, unmans him. He sucks in a shuddering breath. He's glad Eve isn't here to see this.

  “Which department?”

  “Training Sales.”

  “Training Sales . . .” Gretel flips through her papers. “Training Sales has been consolidated into Staff Services. The new department is on level 11.” She looks up. “All Training Sales staff have been retained.”

  Freddy's vision washes white. His fingers gouge the desk. Saved! Saved! The crowd gasps. Freddy lets out a whoop. He wants to kiss Gretel. He wants to kiss Security. He starts to laugh.

  “Marketing Research,” the willowy graduate says hoarsely, and Gretel runs her finger down the paper. Freddy comes to his senses and pushes his way through the crowd. He elbows, he shoulders; still, he is not quite far enough away to avoid hearing Gretel's response, or the ache of empathy that fills her voice.

  An hour of this and even Alpha gets bored. Attention wanders from the monitors. Agents begin to discuss other projects, and the excellence of the BMW X5, and how terrific Blake's eye patch looks and where did he get it. Jones picks up his briefcase and begins to walk away. Klausman calls, “Going somewhere, Jones?” and Jones says, “To work,” without stopping.

  Eve catches him by the elevators. She leans against the wall, tilting her head so her dark hair splashes on her shoulder. “Can we talk?”

  He shrugs.

  “I wasn't sure you'd show up today. You didn't answer any of my messages.” When Jones doesn't respond to this, she continues carefully. “Not that I blame you. I'm sorry about Friday. I really am. I kind of lost it.”

  He looks at her.

  “You're so new, Jones. I forgot that. I expected you to take on too much too fast. This is a tough business, a really tough business, and I want you to succeed. You have such an opportunity here. I don't want you to lose it. But I didn'
t go about it the right way on Friday. I got mad and . . . I didn't mean to do that.”

  She looks so sincere; it's unsettling. When Jones drove down the parking-lot ramp this morning, he gripped his steering wheel as if he was trying to choke it to death. He spent the weekend mining out a deep, thick reservoir of bitterness toward Eve and Alpha—toward business in general, really—and the result of this was the resolution that while he might be powerless to change Alpha, he could at least hate them. This was, admittedly, not the most insightful or productive decision—but it was a decision nonetheless, one that allowed him to determine a kind of way forward. Now even this is under threat, because with Eve looking at him with earnestness swimming in her big bedroom eyes it's hard to cast her as the personification of corporate heartlessness.

  He shrugs. “You told me the truth. I guess I needed to hear it.”

  She puts her hand on his arm. “Jones, you have this amazing empathy for the Zephyr staff. It's . . . unusual in Alpha. It's not especially helpful, doing what we do. But I shouldn't have told you it's wrong. I realize now it's that empathy that makes you special. I don't want you to lose it.”

  Jones is lost for words.

  “Now,” she says, “don't tell anyone in Alpha I said that. This is our little secret.” She smiles, as if this is a joke, but there's no trace of humor in her eyes. “All right?”

  Another agent, Tom Mandrake, comes out of the monitoring room and walks toward them, whistling. Eve removes her hand from Jones's arm and steps back. “By the way, I bought this dress for you. Do you like?”

  “Um,” Jones says. “Yes, it's very nice.”

  She smiles, genuinely, and does a little half curtsy. “Actually, to be honest, I bought it a month ago. But I wore it for the first time today.”