by steve higgs
‘I don’t need a sidekick full stop, I’m afraid. I need an administrative assistant that can answer emails, sort files and prepare invoices.’
‘Really?’ he said in a normal voice. He sounded both incredulous and disappointed. ‘I thought that was just superhero code. Are you sure you don’t need the world’s most silent sidekick?’
‘Quite sure, I’m afraid.’
‘Oh.’
‘Do you have any experience with office administration?' I asked although I was sure I already knew the answer.
‘Erm,' he started, ‘not really. I expected to be fighting creatures of the night with you. I slept outside all night to make sure I was the first one through the door this morning.'
‘Well, I commend you for your determination, but I don’t fight creatures of the night. I solve cases that people believe have a supernatural explanation and what I need is an office assistant to handle the paperwork.’ The slug looked a little despondent and I was beginning to feel sorry for him. ‘I tell you what, leave me your email address and if I ever need your particular set of skills, I will call you.’
‘Really?’ he brightened.
‘Absolutely.’
Anything to get you out of my office, you total, grade A nut bag.
He scribbled his email address on a noticeboard and skipped back down the stairs. From my position stood near the door in my small office, I could see the next in line peer around the corner, come to a decision and head up the stairs towards me.
From my vantage point above him, I could see that he was wearing a suit. A good start, I thought. He also had on a tie, his shoes looked new and neat and his hair was elegantly styled with a side parting.
This could be much better.
As he reached the top of the stairs, I took a step forward to shake his hand, but no hand was offered in return. Instead, he grasped the front of his suit with both hands then he yanked hard and ripped his entire outfit off as one, to reveal a Spiderman outfit beneath. He then reached behind his head to pull the face piece down to cover his features.
Perfect.
I had to commend him for his efforts. The suit had clearly been carefully tailored so he could rip it off as one and must have taken some time and effort to create. In addition, although I suspected one could buy such things online, the Spiderman outfit was also utterly convincing, and it fit him well.
There was no getting away from the fact that this was precisely not what I wanted to hire though. So, I skipped formalities and got to the point. ‘I need an office admin assistant, not a Spiderman wannabe. Is there any chance you can wear sensible clothes and perform mundane office tasks?’
‘Are you kidding? You have Spiderman in front of you and you want me to answer the phone and take notes?' He was completely serious.
‘It seems prudent to point out that I advertised for a part time administrative assistant, not Spiderman.’
‘Well yes, but any fool can hire an office clerk. What you need is a crime fighting partner, someone who has superhuman strength and isn’t afraid to trade blows with evil villains.’ I was finding it quite distracting that I could not see his eyes at all and when he spoke I could not see his mouth, only the face mask moving. I gave him another look. He was not very muscular.
Curious now I decided to test him ‘So, with your superhuman strength, how many press ups would you say you can perform?’
‘All of them!’ he shot back.
‘Okay, Spiderman. Crack on.' I took a seat by the window, so he would have the whole office floorspace on which to impress me.
‘Err. Ok.’ he said, sounding decidedly less certain now. He fell forward into a traditional press up position and started actually doing press ups.
‘I'll count for you.' I offered and began to call them out. ‘Two, three, Four, Five, Six, Seven, Eight.' The next one came a little slower than the previous ones. ‘Niiiine.' I counted as he slowly rose back to the start position. He went down again, got about halfway back up and the T of ten died on my lips.
He collapsed on the carpet breathing hard. ‘I think,' he managed between breaths, ‘that I have to be actually fighting crime,' more breaths, ‘for the superhuman strength to work.' he finished.
I had pandered to his fantasy for long enough ‘I don't think this will work out. I need an office assistant. Really that's all I need. Thank you for coming in.' I didn't leave him room to present an argument but offered my hand to get him back up. I gave him his discarded business suit as I showed him towards the door. ‘Send the next one up, won't you?' I asked of his back as he descended the stairs.
I checked my watch to see how much time I had wasted already and sitting down behind my desk ready for the next candidate.
The next chap through the door was wearing a poor-quality black suit and had a very chunky but battered looking briefcase in his left hand. His hair was thinning, and his waist was expanding as one sees in so many middle-aged men. Despite his suit and hair and waist he had a professionally broad smile and came right at me to shake my hand.
‘Reg Parker.' he said introducing himself. He placed the briefcase on my desk, popped the clips to open it and swung it around to face me. ‘I have for you, Mr. Michaels, every piece of high-tech ghost-hunting and supernatural detection equipment you could possibly want.' He proceeded to point out and name the gadgets in the case. ‘EMF meter, full spectrum camera, EVP recorder, NVGs, motion sensors able to detect ethereal matter.'
Inside the case was an array of gadgets, some that I recognised, such as night vision goggles, but most were odd looking and obscure with a dubious number of buttons and LEDs. I picked up the set of NVGs.
‘Best that money can buy.' Reg told me, lying. They were old British military issue circa 1990. I had worn the exact same model a few times back in the day. They looked serviceable, but such things were not hard to come by anymore. I put them back in the case, my brief curiosity satisfied. ‘They are not all that special compared with some of my more specialist equipment.' he said, selecting an odd-looking box with a small screen. He flicked it on and to me, it looked like a cheap oscilloscope. The analogue screen could have been taken from a 1970s television except it was only two inches square. He extended two antennae from the top, the old slide out chrome type one would find on an analogue radio thirty years ago. High-tech this was not.
‘What does it do, Mr Parker?’ I genuinely wanted to hear the codswallop that he had prepared to explain the item.
‘The latest in PKE – that is Parapsychotic kinetic energy detecting equipment.’
Wrong, I thought to myself, certain the correct term is Psychokinetic Energy.
‘What this sweet thing will do is allow you to find the source of the ghost's energy, the point that is anchoring it to the earth still. Once found you can destroy the object it has linked itself to and free it to enter the spirit realm. I am happy to give you a full demonstration of each piece of equipment once the purchase is made.
I had to hand it to Reg - he was utterly fluent in bullshit. The meaningless words just fell from his mouth and he delivered them with such conviction. It was entertaining, but I felt that I had better things to do with my time.
‘Mr. Parker, I am curious to hear how much of this equipment you sell.'
‘It would depend on whether you wanted the figure for the domestic market or global sales.’ Again, there was not the slightest hesitation in his lie. I could really admire salespeople. ‘Now, I can offer you today an introductory discount of fifty percent if you spend over £2500.00 and take out finance.’ He paused for effect before delivering the killer line. ‘This is a one day offer only though. I’m afraid I have several customers waiting and quite limited stock because it is in such high demand.’
‘Two thousand five hundred pounds. You cannot take a penny less?’
‘No hard bargaining I'm afraid, Mr. Michaels. I can see you are a savvy customer, but these are rare items. I have the finance paperwork right here. Shall we get started?'
; ‘I'm afraid it is just too much money for me, Mr. Parker.'
‘Oh. Err, are you sure?’ He looked unsure for the first time since entering my office.
‘Quite sure. You did say you had other customers waiting. Perhaps they will have more secure funds than I.’
‘But, the finance, Mr. Michaels. Very affordable repayments.' he said with a smile.
‘Perhaps you should leave me your card. That way I can contact you if I need any of these items.’
‘Supply and demand, sir. If you need it at a rush it will cost more.’
‘I will take the risk.’
Reg looked as if he were going to restart with a fresh tactic, but either he realised it was pointless or perhaps conceded to himself that he had a case full of crap and had not been able to swindle me and so should move on. Whatever the case was, he gave up and put his sad collection of worthless electronics away.
‘You cannot blame a chap for trying.’ he said as he took his briefcase and headed back out the door and down the stairs.
I decided I had wasted enough time. The endless line of candidates I had seen outside seemed unlikely to yield a worthwhile employee. It was the first time I had ever interviewed someone for a job. I didn’t count Amanda. I had been erring on the polite side and holding my tongue instead of telling the crazies what I thought. I had done that for long enough though.
As I got to the top of the stairs and started down them the door to the bottom opened and a middle-aged woman entered. She was dressed as the fifth incarnation of Dr. Who - the one that Peter Davidson played. She even had a cricket bat under her left arm.
I held out a warning hand for her to stop. ‘Hell, no.' I told her dismissively, as I brushed past her and out into the street.
It was cool out today and overcast. It threatened to rain again although it was currently dry. The line of applicants for my crappy admin assistant role had grown. I estimated that there must be over one hundred people and they were all wearing costumes of some kind or were desperately odd looking. What I mean by that is they appeared to have not checked themselves in a mirror. Ever. They had crazy hair, their clothes in general not only failed to coordinate but also appeared to have escaped from a prior century. I am not one to follow, or even advocate following fashion, nor do I think vanity is something to be admired. But, come on guys.
I was being watched by the people standing in line. Most were giving me an engaging smile, some were dressed as warriors and were trying to look tough. One, a young lady, blew me a kiss and flicked her head to make her hair move. It was probably supposed to be sexy, but it caught in the beard of the chap behind her who was dressed as a wizard. I ignored the pair while they tried to untangle themselves. I took two steps out into the street so that more of the line could see me and raised my hands.
‘I am Tempest Michaels. I advertised for an administrative assistant. That is the only job on offer today. The job involves managing emails, answering the phone and some filing. Nothing else.’ I could see there were going to be questions. ‘There is no ghostbusting to be had, no fighting the forces of evil. I am not looking to employ someone to help me battle witchcraft or prevent a coming alien invasion.’ Some of the hands that had been beginning to rise had gone back down. ‘Unless you are here to interview for a job that involves a bit of typing, dealing with invoices and sifting emails please leave.’
No one moved for several seconds and I thought I was going to have to reinforce the concept somehow. Then a Mace Windu lookalike gave up brandishing his very authentic looking purple lightsabre, switched it off and began trudging away. It opened a floodgate. Soon the costume party was drifting down Rochester High street, some towards Chatham, some towards the bridge over the muddy river Medway and perhaps onwards towards Strood. Others crossed the road and went into the coffee shop. Just one chap came directly towards me. He was dressed in an outfit that would not have seemed unusual were it not for the company that he had just been keeping. Coming through the crowd of Jedi, wizards, knights, Ghostbusters etcetera I took more notice and could see that his suit was in fact not so much a suit, which of course it was, but it was a suit from two hundred years ago, complete with pocket watch, greatcoat and a swagger stick with a polished chrome knob in his right hand. His face was full of knowing importance. Clearly, my instructions did not apply to him, or at least that was what he believed. I realised he was dressed as Sherlock Holmes. Or better yet as Basil Rathbone dressed to play Sherlock Holmes.
‘I can perform all the tasks you have demanded.’ he said, his voice a soothing baritone.
‘You have other skills that you wish to be considered though?’ I coaxed.
‘Indeed. You may recognise me. I am a famous detective. My death was reported in 1893. However, I survived the fall from the Reichenbach falls and was transported forward in time to find myself here. My name is Sherlock Holmes and I am here to offer you my skills to solve the cases that will baffle you.’
I looked past him. As the crowd dispersed and the numbers thinned, I was left with just one in the queue. A man in his early twenties. He looked vaguely familiar. I turned my attention back to the man in front of me. I had an urge to be abrupt and rude, it seemed the swiftest method of ending this exchange. It was not in my nature to do so though. Instead, I smiled politely ‘I'm afraid I would find myself as the weaker part of such a partnership and that does not appeal. I am sure you understand.'
Thankfully he nodded. I extended my hand, we shook, and I stepped around him and towards the young man who was now stood just a few feet from the door that led to my office.
‘Shall we get started?’ I asked and ushered him towards the door. I went up the stairs quickly, taking my jacket off as I went. ‘Please come in. Take a seat.’
The chap came in behind me and took the seat in front of my desk as I went around to sit behind it. ‘Good morning. As you are the only candidate that has survived the initial filtering process the job is now yours provided you can demonstrate sufficient aptitude. Can I assume you speak English?'
‘Yes. Very much so.' His accent was local. I was glad for it. It would not have mattered if the chap had been Ukrainian, or Polish or even French, nevertheless I was pleased that English was his native language.
‘Here is my keyboard.' I said passing it to him and swivelling the screen so that he could see it. ‘Please navigate to Microsoft word and write a passage about what you had for breakfast this morning.'
He took the keyboard and mouse and got going. I had him perform a few other basic tasks just to reassure myself he was capable. I asked him questions as he was doing it. Why he was interested in the job? How was it that he was available? What other experience he had and what other jobs he had held? I wanted to make sure he could speak articulately and answer questions while he was typing. Five minutes after he walked into my office, I could not find anything further to ask him or any further tasks to set him and not a single reason why I should not employ him.
‘I just realised that I have not yet asked you your name.’
He did not reply immediately though. He was sitting, looking at me with his head cocked slightly to one side as if he wanted to ask a question rather than introduce himself.
‘And your name is?' I prompted.
‘Jim Butterworth.’
Jim Butterworth. The name sounded familiar. I knew it from somewhere. Where did I know it from? My brain was attempting to connect the two dots but could not quite make them touch.
‘You might know me better as Demedicus.’
Bingo! Ding, ding, ding, ding, ding.
Now I knew why he looked familiar. Three weeks ago, I had been called by his grandmother who had been convinced he was a vampire. She had wanted me to kill him. He was no longer dressed as a vampire though. The last time I had seen him his finger nails had been painted black, he had been wearing eyeliner and he had convinced himself that he was a vampire. He was living in a basement, sleeping in a coffin and had threatened to kill me for disturbing his slumber
.
‘Right. Well, thank you for coming in. You look very different.' He was wearing normal person clothes. A pair of grey trousers, black shoes, a white shirt and a coat.
Are you still living with your Grandmother?’ I asked
‘Err, no. No, Granny kicked me out.’
‘Oh.’
‘Yes. I am living with my boyfriend now. I hope that doesn’t bother you.
‘I cannot imagine why it would.' I said. There are millions of gay people. The world is filled with people of different race, religion, gender. They are separated and connected by their interests, beliefs, hopes, and dreams. I wished them all every happiness and generally hoped they would leave me alone and stop killing one another.
‘This is a new thing actually.’ I guess James wanted to tell me about it even though I had not prompted more information. ‘After you killed our Master, Ambrogio.’
‘I didn’t kill him, James. He died attempting to escape justice and after he had given me a sound beating.’
‘Yes, sorry. Anyway, you did us all a favour killing him. After that the club fell apart and I decided I didn’t want to be a vampire anymore and that made me question some other decisions and I realised that I am LGBT.’
Probably not all four at the same time I suspected. Maybe not L at all - equipment deficiency and all that.
‘Is there anything else you want to know?' he asked looking a little sheepish as if he now felt that he had told me far more than I needed to know.
‘When can you start?’
It turned out he had nothing planned for the rest of the day, so we discussed pay and hours and probation period. I had read all about such things this morning while I was eating my breakfast so that I had a slight idea what I ought to pay and how I should manage an employee. Then I left him sitting at my desk sifting emails while I went to the bank.
Spectral Dog Case. Tuesday, 12th October 1100hrs
When I got back to the office, James was on the phone. He was diligently taking notes on a pad I kept on the desk, the phone trapped between his shoulder and ear to leave his hands free.