“But what is it?” Sylvia said. “I don’t understand.”
“The Eye Bleach Lounge is an exclusive area we set up for members of our Quart team to decompress,” Heather said. “Especially after they watch something particularly disturbing. Inside it is all pastel-colored walls, soothing music, fresh cut flowers delivered daily, and of course hours and hours of cat videos.” She smiled and added, “We even have real live animals brought in there for cuddle time. Kittens especially — since everyone knows they make even the most heinous events palatable.”
Sylvia said, “well, I am more of a dog person.”
“Yeah, so am I,” Steve said. “And that’s why we bring in puppies occasionally, too. Every Thursday. But, hopefully, you won’t have to visit too often. You strike me as a resilient person. I have a sense of these things.”
“Thanks,” Sylvia said.
“But, despite that, I still like to find out where all of my people’s pressure points are in advance. It helps me to funnel the right videos to the right person. Everyone has something they can’t handle.”
“Do they? I have my own theory on that…” Sylvia said. “But, now I am curious. What is yours?”
“For me,” Steve said, “it is bodily fluids. I can’t take it. Snot, piss, shit…, ugh. It’s all too much.”
“Not such a tough guy, are you, Steve?” Heather said as her grin turned into a smirk. She glanced over at Sylvia and said, “Don’t let the rough Biker Garb fool you. Inside, Steve is nothing but a big leather-clad pussycat.”
“Well, I especially draw the line at vomit. But hey, I have seen you retreat into the Eye Wash Lounge over much less, Heather,” Steve said as he laughed. “She can be such a prude, you know,” he added as he looked over at Sylvia.
Heather turned to Sylvia and said, “I am no prude, despite what Steve is insinuating. But…, I am also not warped — like he is. Certain private functions between consenting adults are best left…, private. I have not fully joined the ranks of Perve City.”
“Her line of thinking is in a distinct minority down here,” Steve said as he turned to Sylvia and smiled. “You would be surprised what she finds offensive.” He wrinkled his nose and said, “So uptight, really — quite sad. It’s a wonder she is able to review any videos.”
Heather, pointing at Steve, said, “Uptight, says the man wearing the ‘Fisting Rainbow Bright’ T-Shirt.” She rolled her eyes, looked at Sylvia and added, “Like I said, Perve City! But, despite what he says, my main issue is with seeing anything happen to animals. That is where my line is drawn. Disgusting!”
“So, Sylvia,” Steve said. “We came clean to you, now you need to confess to us. What sets your teeth on edge?”
“I don’t know,” Sylvia said. “But…, I have a feeling, I am going to find out.”
Steve’s smile widened, and his eyes glinted as he said, “Yeah, you probably are.” He turned to Heather and said, “So, where should we put her? Any empty desks nearby? The churn has seemed to settle down a bit lately.”
“Alyssa’s desk is open,” Heather said.
“Alyssa? Are you sure?” Steve said.
“I should be,” Heather said. “She has not been in for a while now, and no one has heard from her.”
“Maybe she is on vacation, I will check the—”
“—I don’t think so. I am pretty confident Alyssa is never coming back.”
Steve shook his head and said, “Such a shame. Alyssa was really coming along, too. Well…,” he added as he turned to Sylvia, “We are always short on desks so we can start you in her spot. If she does come back, we may have to move you. I hope you don’t mind.”
“No, no problem,” Sylvia said.
Heather smiled at Sylvia and mouthed, “She is not coming back.”
As Steve and Heather guided Sylvia through the caverns of repetitive cubicles, Steve ran down the basics. Sylvia learned she would be working through a queue of videos that Steve would assign at the end of each day for the next day’s work. At the end of each video, she would answer a series of questions. He claimed it was for proper categorization, but, it was evident what the true object was. UVid was no fool. They were trying to ‘teach’ the AI. Well…, perhaps she could help. Her analytical researcher instincts began to tingle at the prospect of tapping into the collective ID of the entire world. Some habits were hard to break — the academic urge always dominates. Who knows, this might even be fun?
Each video she watched needed to be categorized into various slots, from gratuitous violence on one end of the spectrum, through hate speech and criminal activity in the middle all the way to standard, run-of-the-mill porn at the other end. There were categories for offenses related to religious sensitivities, animal cruelty, child abuse, simulated rape and murder, and other crimes as well. And of course, nudity and explicit adult content was its own category with an incredible myriad of subcategories. Shockingly, in addition to subcategorizing each video into its proper slot, she was also to rate the level of offense on a ten-point scale, with ten requiring an instant ban of the video and the account that posted it. She shuddered to think what an Animal Cruelty or Child Abuse rating of 10 would entail.
Sylvia was pleased to learn that anything illegal she discovered was to be reported immediately. This point was emphasized several times, so she knew it was sincere. UVid has a vigorous policy to cooperate with the justice department on anything that may be linked to a crime. This is a top priority. This cooperation is no doubt one of the many reasons the Feds kept a hands-off attitude to the internet giant.
When Steve explained that at least ten or twelve times a week an actual suicide is filmed and uploaded to UVid, Sylvia felt her throat grow dry. He also told her of a host of other horrific real-life criminal acts they routinely receive, too awful to detail. Was it not enough to commit the crime, she wondered? Was the level of perversion of these individuals so deep they were compelled to film it, too, and then broadcast it to the world?
People, despite her years of study of the human mind, remained ultimately mysterious — especially when exploring the depths and degree of their total depravity. The trick, Steve said, was determining real crimes from fake, but, in time, he assured her she would learn how to distinguish. He said it was more of an art than a science, but, he was confident she would catch on quickly. She hoped he was right. When they reached the end of the row of cubicles, Sylvia saw an empty desk.
“And here we are, your new home,” Steve said. “At least, assuming Alyssa doesn’t return.”
“I told you, Steve. She’s not coming back,” Heather said.
“She might, you never know,” Steve said as he pointed to the desk. “After all, she left all of her stuff. Who leaves all their stuff behind?”
“Obviously, Alyssa. But, Sylvia is going to be a lot more fun as a neighbor. See,” Heather said as she pointed to the adjacent cubicle. It was hers and she added, “you are right beside me.”
“I wonder if this is going to be a problem?” Steve said as he smiled. “Having you two together is going to lead to all sorts of trouble. I can just sense it.”
“Don’t worry, Boss,” Heather said. “We will go easy on you.”
“OK,” Steve said as he shook Sylvia’s hand. “Once again, welcome aboard.” He leaned over the keyboard and typed in a Username and Password on the computer. “I hope you don’t mind, but, I am going to have you work through Alyssa’s queue today. I got it all set up already, and…”
“And he is too lazy to set up a new one for you right now,” Heather said.
“Bingo,” Steve said. After a few more keystrokes, the UVid welcome screen filled the monitor. “There we go. All good to go. If you need to take a break, just click on pause. Otherwise, the videos will just advance automatically.”
“OK, Steve, got it.”
“Good luck,” he said as he turned and left for his office. He called back, “and if you have any questions, your neighbor there will be sure to provide a good answer.”
>
After Steve left and Heather returned to her cubicle, Sylvia sat down at her new desk and breathed in deeply. It was just as she hoped; in fact, it was much better. These next few weeks would be a full immersion into a world she wanted to understand, and what better way to help people in this world than to live in it herself. Steve seemed great and Heather was a hoot. She didn’t like most people, generally, but she liked them. That certainly was an unexpected bonus.
She leaned back into her surprisingly comfortable chair and glanced over her workspace. She smiled. It would do. Despite its small size, it was, in reality, not that much smaller than her ‘private’ office back at NYU. Sylvia examined her surroundings and took inventory of what Alyssa had left behind. It wasn’t much of value, really. A lone picture frame sat on the desk along with an array of other personal items: a personalized coffee mug, a Star Wars mini-poster, various animal and or motivational stickers and other bric-a-brac common in most office settings. Sylvia turned her attention back to the frame and studied the picture carefully. It was a photo of a young woman that looked to be in her late 20s, maybe 30 at the oldest. She was a fairly non-descript, typical California girl: long blonde hair, bright shining face, blue eyes. The picture was a stereotypical beach snap — something you would see on thousands of desks around the country. There was something, though…, something familiar. What made you leave, Alyssa? What was the final straw?
“Did you know Alyssa?” Sylvia asked.
“A little,” Heather called out from the other side of the divider. “But honestly, I did not get to know her that well. She was a bit standoffish.”
“Oh? How so?”
“Well…, we didn’t have much in common, actually,” Heather said. “She was more of a…, how can I say this politely? I guess I can’t. She was more of a reality TV type of gal if you get my drift.”
“Ah, yes. I see,” Sylvia said.
“Not to be mean, or anything,” Heather said. “But, the girl wasn’t that bright. I doubt she had a single deep thought in that bleach-bottled blonde head of hers.”
Sylvia glanced back down at the photo and focused on Alyssa’s face. It is hard to draw conclusions from just a picture. Years of her graduate training, along with having dealt with thousands of students, did come in handy in rendering some snap judgments. Alyssa certainly didn’t look stupid, that was too harsh, but, she did have a certain innocent quality about her face. As she looked back at Heather, poking her head over the divider, Sylvia grinned. It was no secret why the two women didn’t get along. The contrast between them could not have been greater. Where Alyssa was a sun-kissed, bright and friendly blonde, Heather was far darker, bordering on Goth. Her long black hair, stark white makeup and the prominent nose ring glimmering on her face shouted that Heather was a blend of world-weariness mixed with cynicism and a healthy dose of snark thrown in. Interesting flavor, but no doubt a bit bitter. Yeah, I bet poor old Alyssa didn’t get along too well here. The bright hopeful young face gazing up at her from the picture didn’t look like it had a cynical or dark thought under those blonde tresses.
Sylvia said, “It is odd she would just leave everything behind like this, though. Especially this picture. The frame is silver and engraved, so it was obviously very important to her. It makes one wonder.”
“It is not that odd, really. I don’t want to be unkind, but, Alyssa was an airhead and…, a bit too squeamish for this job. Trust me, she was a frequent visitor to the Eye Bleach lounge. I knew the first day she got here she would not last.”
“Well,” Sylvia said. “I shudder to know what you think about me, then?”
“Oh, I have a good feeling about you, girl,” Heather said. “You strike me as someone with a soul of pure steel.”
“I guess I will take that as a compliment,” Sylvia said. After a pause, she turned back to her monitor and moved her cursor over to the play button. Putting in her earbuds, she settled in. This, she thought, ought to be interesting.
Three hours later, and Sylvia was anything but interested. Surprisingly, she found the job to be strangely dull. Filth and degradation can get terribly repetitive after a while. Perhaps it was her iron-like constitution that prevented her from being offended, or the years of working with some seriously disturbed individuals? She really had heard most everything.
The videos she reviewed had been a relatively routine mashup of what she had expected. Fools faking their own deaths, which made her wonder how many hundreds of gallons of Karo Syrup she had just watched being splattered all over the place making these cheap fake horror “masterpieces”? Also, lots of very inappropriate, highly sexualized videos were in the queue. It seems that in the race between Porn and Art, Porn was winning — hands down. She sighed as she watched yet another highly flexible, and apparently quite open-minded girl, insert something somewhere that should not be filmed. She yawned when the next video started and she watched a guy in an Elmer Fudd-like hunting outfit wander out into a large open field.
“Well…, this should be entertaining. At least it is creative,” Sylvia thought as she watched the “hunter” crouch down and aim his gun into the woods. After the shot was fired, and she determined a large black bear had been killed, she wondered exactly why the UVid algorithm had flagged this video for review. The internet has thousands of hours of hunting videos that were perfectly fine. What made this one questionable? When a rather top heavy, and quite naked, young woman entered the frame and started disrobing the hunter, she had her answer. As they approached the poor dead animal, both naked, and then proceeded to…, to…, she quickly reached out and turned off her screen.
As she took off her headphones, the hunter’s loud taunting frat boyish shouts could be clearly heard. “Shake that bear! Yeah! Shake that bear!”
“Oh no,” Heather said as she overheard the audio, and she arose from her chair and leaned over the cubicle wall. “I see you got the infamous ‘Bear Lovers’ video in your queue.”
“Uh…, yeah…,” Sylvia said as she swallowed hard. She turned the monitor back on and paused the video. It was horrific, but, try as she might, she could not look away from the screen. Even paused, it was about the worst thing she had ever seen, and all she could focus on were the cold dead eyes of the animal shown in closeup.
“Do you need to….,” Heather said as she gestured down the hall towards the Eye Bleach Lounge.
“No…,” Sylvia said. “I…, I will be all right. I just need a second to…, regroup.”
“Candy time!” Nancy called out as she turned into Sylvia’s row and ferried her cart through the maze of cubicles. One by one the other employees nearby spun around and began making their snack selections, swarming over the shelves of her cart like a school of sharks attacking a fresh dump of chum in the water.
“Well, that could not have been timed better,” Heather said as a smile formed on her face. “Girl, you know what you need?”
“No. What?” Sylvia asked.
“You need chocolate,” Heather said. “I know I happened upon that horrid video a few months ago, and it led to my scarfing down at least a quart of ice cream when I got home to my apartment. It was disgusting! I am sure it was under another name then, no doubt. Those perves keep reposting this garbage under different titles, but, I watched it, and it messed me up pretty bad. Some people are just really — twisted, you know?”
“Yeah,” Sylvia said as she waved to Nancy. When the candy cart rolled over, she asked, “Any Reeses?”
“Any Reeses she asks?” Nancy said as she glanced knowingly over at Heather. “Of course, we have Reeses! We aren’t Barbarians, you know.”
Sylvia took her Reeses cups from the cart while Heather grabbed a Zagnut. Once Nancy was onto the next row, Heather said, “You can take a break, Sylvia. Really. It is not a bad reflection on you to take a mental health pause. Steve is super cool about it.”
“No, I am all right,” Sylvia said. “And you know what,” she added as she popped the second cup in her mouth. “You are right. Choc
olate does help.”
“Works every time,” Heather said. “And, it helps me get through many a day. In time, you will find this is a pretty cool place to work…, assuming you don’t develop diabetes.”
Sylvia laughed. “But…, I wonder. I wonder if Alyssa watched this video? It was in her queue, after all.”
“Nah,” Heather said. “The system always serves up new videos only. Once you view and evaluate it, it won’t come back again. At least, not the exact video.”
“Hmm,” Sylvia said. “It does make me curious. I wonder what video set Alyssa off? I wish there was a way to find out what was the last video she watched before she quit.”
“Assuming it was primarily one video, of course,” Heather said.
“Of course.”
“My money is on her getting hooked up with some doofus, and that’s why she left. She seems that type, too. I thought I noticed her plumping up a bit. I think she might be pregnant.”
“Heather!” Sylvia said.
“I’m just kidding,” Heather said. “But, it 's not really that hard to figure out what Alyssa watched last if you really want to find out.” She came around the divider and stood beside Sylvia, and added, “Since Steve signed you in under his administrator account, you can still see all of her history on this machine.”
“Really?”
“Really,” Heather said as she leaned over Sylvia’s keyboard and typed in a few commands. She pointed at the screen, “See, there is the last video she watched. Something called…, Homecoming, back on…, wow, March 29th!” She grinned and said, “I guess Alyssa has been gone a lot longer than I thought. Like I said, we weren’t close.”
Sylvia said, “yes, that seems obvious.”
“Now you have me curious,” Heather said. “I want to watch the video. Maybe it was some taped reminder of how her empty, vacuous life was coming to nothing and she decided to run off and join a cult or something.”
“Heather!”
“I’m sorry, that was a bit bitchy,” Heather said. “Even for me. I can’t help it. The snark runs hard in my veins.”
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