Microstory 2510: Foundation Director

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Yeah, I think I should take a little bit of credit. I didn’t come up with the idea of the Foundation, but I definitely pointed Landis in the right direction. I suppose that’s why they call me The Director now. I was the first person he told when it happened. He actually gave me the whole story, and I’ve been sworn to secrecy for a lot of it. So let me start at the beginning of this journey. We were goofing off in our apartment, as we did all the time. He moved in after his girlfriend dumped him, and neither of us could afford something big or fancy. I slept on the pullout couch that didn’t pull out, because it was totally broken. Anyway, he was always so irresponsible, and on this day, he had left, like, a big knife on the counter, hanging over the sink. I tripped, instinctually tried to reach out for something to keep from falling, and ended up grabbing that knife on the wrong end. Had it been sitting right on the counter, I think I would have been okay, but the fact that it was hanging over the edge meant that I gripped it, so the blade dug deep into my palm. Well, he was freaking out, hyperventilating, and wishing that it would heal. Of course, you know how this story ends. It worked! I was healed. I won’t go into the gory details, but we spent the rest of the day testing it out, and pushing the boundaries. We made some mistakes. Like, we didn’t know right away that it was his breath where the magic was coming from. But as you can see, I’m okay now. We have all the answers. As I said, I didn’t come up with the idea of making this whole organization, but I did say that he could make money. I knew there would be people who would pay their entire life savings for a cure, and for some people in this world, that meant a lot of money. I’m the one who did the research, and found his first real guinea pig, who ended up paying a buttload of cash for it. That’s how Landis and I were able to buy the hotel, and get this whole thing officially started. That’s right, I’m part owner of the hotel. I don’t really do anything to keep it running, so my title is a bit of a misnomer. We hired a lot of great people to do all the work for us, but the staff asks me for approval to make changes and stuff, because Landis obviously doesn’t have time for any of that. I’m not this big, smart businessman, but I do speak for Landis in this regard. You might never have heard of me, and it might not be much, but that’s how I contribute to the cause.

Microstory 2402: Castledome

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I had the rare opportunity to visit Castledome. For those of you not in the know, this was the first dome ever built on the surface of this planet. They’re not even sure if the original colonist was intending to build more domes at the time, or if he just needed a breathable place to live. This is where the leadership and other sentient staff members of the whole planet live and work. Obviously, there’s a castle, but that’s not all. They’ve built up a whole village in the surrounding areas, giving it the real feel of a medieval settlement. Everything on the outside looks really archaic and simplistic. I’m not sure if the old-timey machines are functional, like the water mill, or the wagons that I see strewn about, but I’m sure they are. I didn’t spend a whole lot of time outside, or inside, for that matter. I was only granted a one night stay in one of the towers as a sort of treat. To be fair, this planet is still in its early stages. They’re still testing a lot of these hotspots, so I’m sure more people will have the chance to do what I did. It was interesting to be in all that stone architecture. I’m fairly young, so I just don’t have any experience with that sort of thing. But don’t fret, it wasn’t all rustic. They still have computers and a network connection. The bed might have looked old, but the mattress was still really comfortable, and came with all the adjustable settings and smart sensors. I was hoping to get a chance to meet the planet’s owner, but he was just too busy. I can imagine that running this place is not easy, even though he has a full staff of dedicated personnel. This may change in the future, but there aren’t any activities or adventures in this particular dome. It’s just for living and exploring, and again, it’s not available to everyone since that’s where all the people work. Check it out if you can, but don’t get your hopes up.

Microstory 2179: Moving in the Right Direction

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I’ve received word from human resources that my job descriptions have been approved for posting. I believe that most of them will go out to the job boards starting on Monday. There’s stuff that they have to do, with pasting my verbiage, and adding their own, like the company’s mission, hiring policies, and the location details. I don’t have to worry about any of that stuff myself, but if you’ve ever applied to a job online, you now what I’m talking about. If you’re looking for a chance, or you’re in between jobs right now, I encourage you to apply. We will be seeking an expert for each of the following positions: Behavioral Psychologist, Jail Counselor, Addiction Counselor, Conflict Resolution Specialist, Job Counselor, Logistician, Data Analyst, Computer Expert, Criminal Lawyer, Immigration Lawyer, Social Worker, Cultural Sensitivity Expert, and Community Volunteer. If you think you would be a good fit for these roles, please be on the lookout for the postings next week. We expect high interest. A few jobs are missing from that list, which will be filled in other ways, such as internal recruitment or direct offers. Note that some team members will be working for my employer as contractors to the jail, while others will be working for the county. We will all be on the same team, though, so for the most part, we won’t even notice. It will only affect the backend situation, like payroll, disciplinary action, and time off requests. I’ve mentioned the concept of co-employment before, and it’s a real danger, which is why I won’t technically be the boss of everyone on the team, only the ones who work for my company. For our county staff members, we will collaborate fully with them on a day-to-day basis, however, they will report to the warden instead. I believe that they are currently looking into creating yet another position to oversee those members, so I could end up with a partner of sorts, or maybe a liaison who doesn’t spend much time in the meetings. It’s unclear at this point, but we’re on track to reaching our target start date of August 1. On that day, we want all positions filled, all equipment and supplies in stock, and to be starting to do the actual work that we’ve been hired to do. So again, if you think you belong on the team, apply sooner rather than later, so we can keep things moving in the right direction. Speaking of keeping things moving, I have to get back to work. I’m predicting ten hour work days for the foreseeable future. That’s the thing about a salary job. I don’t ever clock out, and I always take my work home with me. I’m not complaining, though. I once had a job that only gave me a few hours a day. I could do whatever I wanted with the rest of the day, but I couldn’t afford rent.

Microstory 2178: Taboo For People to Share

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I’ve been working on the job descriptions for my team today, so we can find the right people to apply for them. Human resources will handle the actual search for me, and once a candidate fits their criteria, they’ll pass them on to my desk so I can see if they fit my criteria. I honestly don’t know how it’s going to go, or how many applications I’ll get. When I’ve applied to jobs, it’s been a really frustrating experience. They make you fill out the same information in multiple places, they ask dumb questions that have nothing to do with the position, and worst of all, they don’t get back to you. I actually spoke with someone in HR, and they assured me that they have an auto-rejection subroutine in their system. Everyone who isn’t going to get the job will receive an automatic reply through email about it. It’s the absolute least you can do, right? It’s so easy. I did get a quick update from my alternate self on the other Earth, and right now, he has a job where he processes hundreds of emails per day. So even if a company receives thousands of applications, it should not be that hard to sort them, and shoot off a quick canned response. That’s assuming you don’t make it easy on yourself by sending a single email per day, and blind carbon copy everyone who needs it. And that’s assuming you don’t use more sophisticated methods, like email client scripts, or in our case, a candidate management system with robust automated features. Again, it’s really not that hard. Sorry, it’s just been really annoying in the past, so now that I’m on this side of it, I want to make sure I don’t treat people the way that I’ve been treated. I’ll promise you this too, if your application goes far enough in the process that I’m seeing it, and I choose to not offer you the job, I will take the time to write up a tailored email to you. It won’t be poetry, but it will be sincere, and most importantly, it will exist!

I received some other news today, in the form of my official salary in this new position. My superiors made whispers with the number, but nothing was concrete until now. I know that I’m not supposed to tell you what it is, but truthfully, I think that’s bullshit. That’s not the way it should be done, it’s just the way that it is. No matter what world you’re in, if your society uses a capitalistic system, it’s taboo for people to share their wage information. But that convention is not to protect the people. It’s to protect the corporations. So I’m just gonna come out and say it. I’m now making roughly $108,000 per year. That’s right, I’m at six figures. There’s never been a job quite like this in the country, but they found some close ones. Consultants of this nature usually make just under 100K, but since I’ll be directly responsible for a dozen and a half people, that bumps me up pretty high. I think it’s important for you to know this, because you’re paying for it. My salary comes out of your tax dollars, and I think that it’s only fair that we be transparent about what we’re doing with that money. Don’t worry, I spoke with the legal department to make sure that I’m not violating any sort of non-disclosure agreement. I firmly believe that we need to all be more honest about these things. It empowers workers to advocate for themselves, and to make sure that everyone is earning fair pay for their hard work. Most people aren’t in the industry that I am, but I guess I’m hoping this encourages others to be more open, to help not only themselves, but those who are in less fortunate positions. I hope it doesn’t backfire on me, and just make you angry to see that number, but I don’t think it will. I have faith in you.

Microstory 2177: Dark About a Lot

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Wow. Just. Wow. These are some nice offices in the jail administrative section. We’re on the top floor of the building, and have a great view of the skyline, as well as some greenery. I prefer the latter, but some prefer the former, so it’s the best of both worlds. They’re giving us an entire conference room, which is big enough to accommodate our eighteen person team. I have my own office that comes right off of that room, and the facilities department has set aside four other workspaces for us. Each subdepartment will be able to separate themselves from the group, and focus on their own stuff. At the moment, the only thing that’s ready is the conference room, since it’s pretty much already configured the right way. It’s lined with bookshelves, so I’m thinking that it used to be a library, which they eventually started using for meetings, but I don’t know what has happened with all that since. It was reportedly pretty dusty in here. I said that I wanted to physically work on a lot of this myself, but I am not bummed out that they did all the cleaning for me. I’m more of a designer and arranger than a cleaner. I have really bad allergies, and I just don’t care for it. I’m weird that way. I’m truly grateful for everything that everyone has done in preparation for this new project, and I’m excited to get started. I spent all day yesterday slowly moving things around in my office, and the other four shared spaces. We need a few things that the jail doesn’t already have on hand for us, like computers, and other various things. I drew up a list so facilities and IT will be working on procuring new equipment and supplies this week. I still had plenty to do on that front today.

Tomorrow, I’m probably going to work exclusively on building out the staff. Back when I was looking for a job—or rather, when employers were looking for me—I was able to tell you about them, to some vague degree. I didn’t think that it was a problem to say this and that about a hypothetical position that I was probably not going to end up taking, as long as I didn’t specify which company was offering. Even if the name of the company ended up being publicized, it probably would have been all right. Now I’m on the other side of that, preparing to interview individual innocent people for my team. So I won’t be telling you anything about the candidates during this process. I won’t even say anything about the ones that I hire, unless they unambiguously tell me it’s okay, and probably not even then. They have a right to their privacy, and they shouldn’t feel uncomfortable applying because something may come out about them. Even if it’s good, it’s not my place to divulge it, whatever it may be. They have the ability to set up their own social media accounts, and build their own websites, should they choose to. Of course, confidentiality being a thing, there’s a lot more about my new job that I won’t be able to say. The jail is now my client, and while they’re fully aware of who I am, and what I do online, they’ve not given me permission to say absolutely anything and everything about what we’re doing here. So be prepared to be left in the dark about a lot. I’ll keep you up to date as much as I can, but my posts could get shorter if everything that I start to deal with is strictly privileged information. They could, therefore, get boring if all I can talk about is my private life. The work I’m getting ready to do here, I believe, is in the interest of the public good, so I’m all right letting my site suffer in service to that. Anyway, I’m tired, so I better grab some dinner, and call it a night.

Microstory 1952: The Office

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Myka: Are we really doing this?

Reese: Too late to back out now.

Leonard: Couldn’t we quit, just like any other job?

*they look at him incredulously*

Leonard: Let me guess, it doesn’t work like that on your world.

Reese: You signed a contract. You are required to give your employer one month’s notice if you intend to quit. I’ve never heard of a job that doesn’t work like that.

Leonard: How much notice does my employer have to give before firing me, ha-ha.

Reese: Two months.

Leonard: Oh. Where I’m from, it’s common courtesy to give your boss two weeks, but they don’t have to give you anything. They can have security escort you out immediately.

Myka: That’s sad. Anyway, Reese, this place is nice. I love how you lord over everyone from your perch up here. Did you have any say in how these offices would look?

Reese: Only a little. And this is your perch too. Leonard, your office is the one on my right. Myka, that’s yours on my left.

Myka: I still don’t know what I’m here to do. I’m not an agent, am I?

Leonard: I don’t know the answer to that question either.

Reese: None of us is an agent. Those will be provided by the government at a later date. I believe some of them are presently in training. Leo, they’ll probably ask you to join them at some point, as you will be in charge of the agents and operatives.

Leonard: I thought you were in charge.

Reese: I’m in charge of everyone. Once the paperwork goes through, you’ll be the Supervisory Special Agent.

Leonard: That is quite the step up from where I was. Whew. Okay, it’s good to have a little time to wrap my brain around that.

Myka: And me?

Reese: Facilities. You’ll supervise IT, building management, cleaning, kitchen... Basically everything that keeps the building itself running, you’ll be responsible for that.

Myka: So I should have been consulted with the layout?

Reese: *laughing* They used to use this place for something else. You can choose the layout of the bullpen, and other things, but you probably can’t tear down, or build any new, walls. I want everyone to understand that, while we’re doing this in preparation for a possible alien invasion—or some less obvious form of it—it could happen any day. We want to be ready to work as fast as possible. We may be making a lot of temporary decisions until something more sustainable can be put in place. We already have two fridges and freezers in the break room, though, and this...is a metal government credit card with no spending limit. Myka, buy what you think an office will need.

Myka: *takes the card* I’m on it.

Reese: And Leonard? Tell me what you think about this.

Leonard: *takes it* A new badge. Hm. It’s a lot heavier than the one I had before.

Reese: This is even heavier. *hands him a gun*

Microstory 1951: Leader de Jure

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Reese: SI Eliot! Wait up. I’m glad I caught you.

SI Eliot: Is this urgent, Parsons? I’m about to step into a meeting with the Director.

Reese: It’s about the jobs you offered Mr. Miazga and Miss Tennison?

SI Eliot: You can just call them Leonard and Myka, Agent Parsons. We all know that you’re friends with them. I assume that you’re worried about what our angle is. I assure you that there is no nefarious purpose to our offers. Very few people know what we know, and we would like to keep it that way, at least for now. We believe that the two of them possess valuable skills and knowledge that we may need in the future.

Reese: Well, what about the others; the other three freewomen, and the escapees?

SI Eliot: They have received their own job offers.

Reese: Really?

SI Eliot: Yes. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I really must get in there.

OSI Director: It’s all right, Hisham. This meeting is about him, after all. He may as well be there. It’s not like I need your permission to proceed.

SI Hisham Eliot: Very well. After you, Agent Parsons.

Reese: *stepping into the conference room, and sitting down* This meeting is about me? In what context, may I ask?

OSI Director: How long have you been on loan to us from Fugitive Services?

Reese: A few months.

OSI Director: And before that? How long were you in FS?

Reese: About eleven years, sir.

OSI Director: That’s a decent run. *pauses* How would you like a job here?

Reese: I thought I did a job here, don’t I? My tenure was marked as indefinite.

OSI Director: That’s what I’m saying. Let’s define it. Let’s decide that you’re no longer on loan, but a fulltime permanent employee of the Office of Special Investigations.

Reese: This is...unexpected. I always assumed that I would go back. I never thought about doing anything else. I barely unpacked my belongings in my office here.

OSI Director: That’s probably for the best. If you agreed, we would give you a new one.

Reese: Sir?

Hisham: She wants you to lead the staff of a new department of national security, incorporating personnel and resources from a number of other branches and divisions. You would not be in charge of the office itself, but you would be managing the employees, which would include your friends, and the other...consultants. The National Commander has been discussing doing something like this with us, and the Assembly, for a while now. Officially, the name of this department would be the Department of Exogenic Affairs. Since there’s already a DEA, it would be known as DExA for short.

OSI Director: Does that sound like something that you would be interested in?

Reese: Again, this is quite the surprise. I suppose I should have guessed that something in government would change as a result of these developments, but I never thought I would be considered for a leadership role. I only have de facto experience.

OSI Director: We believe that’s enough. Why don’t you think it over, and get back to us in two days, okay? NatCo wants to get the ball rolling by the end of this month.