Awakening, 2nd edition

by Kuili, Ray N.

  “Listen—” Ed repeated, wedging the cell phone to his head and grimacing as if he was suffering from a toothache.

  Apparently, the invisible disturber of the peace knew where Ed was. It was ju st as obvious that he considered Ed ’s whereabouts irrelevant.

  “What?” Ed said, this time louder. “No way! He did not! Hold on . . .”

  He got up and crossed the room.

  “And they made us hand in our phones . . .” said Brandon .

  “Let’s keep going, ” Chris said. “So what happened last week?”

  But Paul, standing by the flipchart, didn’t reply. His eyes were rooted on the table where just a moment ago Ed had sat. Now Ed was gone. Instead of him, looking lonely at the right side of the table , lay a notebook. An ordinary dark-green notebook. And it was open.

  They all began speaking simultaneously.

  “Can you believe it?”

  “We can’t touch that thing.”

  “Are you crazy?”

  “You can’t be serious.”

  “I don’t know about you, but I ’m peeking.”

  “He could be back any second. Don ’t even think about it!”

  “Are you sure it’s the same one?”

  “We’re all in or all out.”

  “What if I don ’t want to?”

  “Ross, close the door, leave a crack, stand by it.”

  After Alex had harshly uttered these abrupt words, silence crawled warily into the room.

  Ross obediently posted himself by the door.

  “He’s gone, ” he observed through a thin crack. “I can ’t even see him.”

  “Perfect,” the familiar commanding notes clanged in Alex ’s voice. “This is our chance.”

  In complete silence, he stood up, went to the table and closed the notebook abruptly.

  “Everything they write about us is here. It would be stupid not to read it. But everyone must be in. No exceptions.”

  “So everything would be fair, ” added Ross from his lookout post .

  “Drop it,” said Robert. “He wants everyone ’s hands dirty.”

  Alex didn’t argue.

  “Right. Because it ’s good for everyone.”

  “The best way to get into trouble , ” said Stella. “Listen to someone who tells you that something that is clearly fishy is good for you.”

  “Skip the lecture, ” said Paul. “He could be back any moment. Are you in?”

  Stella shrugged.

  “I’m in. But not because of him.”

  “It doesn’t make any difference. Alex, go for it.”

  Alex looked around the silent room and reached for the folder.

  “Wait,” Michael said quietly.

  Alex’s hand froze one inch away from the folder.

  “Did everyone think about the consequences?”

  “Apparently, ” Alex said impatiently. “I don ’t hear anyone objecting. What ’s there to think about?”

  “A bit of e xtra thinking never hurts. You won ’t find any transcript s inside. If anything, you ’ll find conclusion s .”

  Alex looked as if he were about to roll his eyes.

  “Yes. That’s why we want to read it.”

  “Conclusions may be not so convenient for everyone, ” Michael replied vaguely. “But do as you wish. We can always change the rules again.”

  “Alex, just do it, ” demanded Joan. “Mike, take it easy. This has nothing to do with our rules.”

  It is not a secret that secrets come in all varieties. Some stun you, making your heartbeat muffled and rapid. Others, their voice s thin an d yelping, divulge facts that are not worth the paper they are written on. Another kind of secret throw s the one who dares to stir them into a state of dark , gloomy pondering—a dark rabbit hole that could lead anywhere. And then there are the secrets that fall short of meeting expectations and leave you baffled and disappointed.

  The secret of the green folder was of the latter variety .

  Ten minutes after Alex had decisively opened the folder , he was still squinting and grimacing trying to make some sense out of Ed ’s scribbles, while being closely watched by the future lords of corporations. The gazes of the lords to be were slowly becoming more and more confused.

  “So far the system ’s working fine . . . The result is as obvious as ever . . . Scenario #3 is about to develop fully . . . It ’s classic . . . 2:15 a.m.: moved to the second phase . . . Weak opposition . . .”

  Words crawled the paper unhurriedly like caterpillars, forming extremely vague and useless lines. The only useful phra se so far was a fresh note: “A leader has clearly emerged.”

  But who was that leader? The scribbles weren ’t even hinting about this person ’s identity.

  “ . . . Had lunch, ” Alex was reading, wincing. “Expectations are likely too high . . . A vate— A voting is ripening. What does he mean, ‘ripening?’”

  “It’s taken us four days to cut to the chase?” Paul offered an explanation.

  “Who knows,” Alex turned the page. “This is hogwash . Just listen to this: No visible alliances so far . . . Tensions within acceptable boundaries . . .”

  “We have tensions?”

  “Very funny, Paul. Very funny.”

  “The possibility of physical violence is negligible . . .”

  “No kidding, ” said Brandon . “They think it ’s possible.”

  “Everything’s possible around here, ” said Alan in a quiet voi ce.

  Alex broke off reading, shot him a momentary glance, intercepted by an intent look from Michael , then directed his attention back to the folder.

  “Waterloo scenario . . . Pressure is rising , no candidates so far . . . The pace of development does not exceed expectations . . .”

  “It’s almost like they ’re waiting for something to happen, ” observed Brandon . “But what are they waiting for?”

  “Who knows. Any ideas on what the hell they mean by Waterloo ?”

  Alex was plowing ahead, no longer paying any attention to remarks and questions.

  “The second-level influence is insufficient . . . A significant impact is required . . . The overall level of plotting in the group is average . . .”

  Joan coughed.

  “Hogwash,” Alex repeated his conclusion. “No use for it whatsoever. No names, no details . Nothing. And that ’s not the whole thing , anyway . There ’re only a couple of days here. Waste of time.”

  He turned the last page.

  “What do you know ?” said Paul. “Hogwash.”

  Alex was looking silently at the text printed on a letterhead. These weren ’t scrawls. It was a letter—the last page of what appeared to be a multi-page letter. After Ed ’s jerky handwriting , a printed text looked unusually official and solid.

  “—conference, all participating companies agreed to follow the proposed format. According to the agreement (a ttachment D), all participating companies have agreed to recognize fully any contenders selected using your methodology. The enclosed list of candidates fully meets all the requirements provided by your company.

  “We would like to emphasize again the extreme sensitivity of this agreement and urge you to keep it completely confidential in full accordance with the NDA. Even a minor leak of information about the intent of the participating companies to establish a joint venture is likely to have a devastating effect on the success of this enterprise and negatively affect stock performance. Mutual interests reflected in paragraph 4.7 of the c ontract—”

  “I know one of these people, ” Alex uttered slowly, looking at eleven names listed at the bottom of the page.

  “I know one, too, ” said Brandon . “I guess it’s not the same one you know.”

  “You guessed right, ” said Michael, who had walked to the table during the reading session. “Storm is my CEO. And who ’s been sent here by someone named Summers?”

  “That’s me, ” Chris replied gloomily.

  He was staring at the list, looking completely mesm
erized.

  “Mike, I think you were right, ” said Robert. “We ’ll have to change the rules.”

  “So that’s what it is, ” Paul ’s voice was atypically quiet. “It was just a deal, wasn ’t it? And they fed us all this bullshit: leaders, potential, workshop, blah, blah , blah . . . Nice.”

  Despite the bitter words, he did not appear irritated.

  “On the other hand—”

  A loud whisper interrupted him.

  “He’s coming!”

  Ross was almost dancing with panic by the door.

  “He’s coming! He ’s coming!”

  “We wrap up at five, ” Michael said, cutting short everyone ’s stirring, his voice sounding unusually crisp. “And we all meet at the pier at five-thirty.”

  When half a minute later Ed walked into the room, his appearance was hardly noticed by anyone. They were all too busy listening to Brandon ’s speech. Ed headed for his seat and froze momentarily, his gaze set on the lonely folder. Then his eyes made a quick sweep of the room and he resumed his movement, relief written all over his face. No one looked at him—Brandon knew how to spellbind his audience.

  It’s been four days already . . . Four days of being locked up in this hole! Four days of—o kay, let ’s concentrate. It ’s time to concentrate and think.

  Joan crossed her room impatiently. Apparently, the shock had worn off, since she was able to think of nuisances like this. And a good shock it was. To find out after four days of scheming and power play that all of this ha d been nothing but a huge set -up? That the stakes are not just high, but unimaginably, horrendously high? That it ’s not about winning at some important but nevertheless “Who cares after all ” workshop . Not about becoming the fake leader of a fake group, hoping that something good will happen to you back home. Oh, no.

  As it turns out, it ’s all about something entirely different. Something big, something really big. Big and real and tangible. It ’s about the birth of a powerful conglomerate, about giants from different industries joining forces and creating a new behemoth to conquer new markets. It ’s about a new pyramid and—most importantly—about the place at the top of this pyramid.

  Do you know what it really means, the place at the very top of a pyramid? Do you have any idea? The pyramid ’s vertex is not just another step up. It ’s the step up. It ’s the ultimate prize that only some dare to dream about and even fewer get their hands on. It ’s worth all other steps combined. It ’s the single thing that makes the existence of the pyramid possible. Foundational bricks can be replaced. Middle layers—ah, the middle layers—they are even more replaceable than the countless bricks, although of course we don ’t want them to know this. But the vertex is a different story. It gives everyone a sense of purpose. It makes them believe that someone truly cares. It doesn ’t just crown the pyramid—it is the thing that holds it together.

  These Clarks and Eds . . . they never cared about teaching us anything. From day one their job had been to help a dozen powerful companies to select a leader who will head their new joint venture. A young leader —bright, talented and hungry, capable of taking good care of the new enterprise. Everything they ’ve told us was simply a cover -up for their real goal.

  “ . . .Using your methodology . . .” So that’s how they make the choice in cases like this.

  Whenever you read in the papers about mergers and all sorts of joint ventures , you can ’t help but wonder, how do they pick someone to run this new thing? How do they decide who ’s more important, who ’s in charge? With the kind of egos involved at that level , how do you expect them to make the right call for the newly created entity? Well, what do you know, apparently there ’re experts who can help out with that challenge. Perhaps it ’s even a small niche industry. An industry of consultants, of independent judges who help with making the call and see to it that the decision sticks.

  We’re not the first ones to go through this. We ’re not the last. Yet in one aspect we ’re unique. We know why we ’re here. And we ’re not supposed to. It ’s the cornerstone of their notorious methodology. The lack of knowledge. The natural behavior. The ultimate ignorance that is bliss and the key enabler of their approach. But it ’s too late now: we know.

  And that’s why we keep this knowledge to ourselves—who knows what Clark and c o would do if they found out. And that ’s why we had that pointless, tiring, endless, circular, give-me-a-freaking-break discussion there at the pier.

  All those things we said back there . . . We talked about everything. About new realities. About lack of time. About responsibility. About “Can someone explain to me what this joint venture would be doing?” About voting. About timing. About being set up. About being screwed by Clark. About being screwed by our management. About simply being screwed. And again about responsibly. And again about lack of time—a horrible lack of time. As if by spending an hour yammering about it you’d end up with more time. And yet we kept talking.

  Because while listening to all this blabber, while listening to these slogans, while participating tirelessly in the discussion , everyone kept thinking. Everyone kept calculating. Everyone kept modeling. Because the times of blessed ignorance were gone forever. Now you had to think and decide—do you really want this ? And are you ready for this? And would you be able to pull this off? And would you end up in a place too high to fall from and still make it in one piece? And , most importantly—what are you chances? And if you ’re in, if you do want it, how can you, darn it, get what you want? There ’s only one chair at the top. Only one. And there ’re eleven of us . . .

  But if you don’t want it, or if you think that your chances are slim, who do you tie your horse to? Who are you going to carry on your back, on your shoulders, sweating and cursing , to the finish line? Who are you going to wager on?

  And we talked, and talked, and talked . . . Although you have to give it Michael—he kept silent. Alex boomed, stern Brandon talked, Chris, as usual, was trying t o be in charge and take control of the debate, Robert was dropping his usual sort of straight -to -the point sharp comments, Stella was eager to go and fight for something (it looked like she wasn ’t yet sure exactly with whom and for what), Kevin, obviously was chewing everyone ’s ear off with his moral values remarks, Alan was objecting gloomily to . . . well, to everyone, actually. And Ross was absolutely unbearable—he was just making everyone sick with his , “Let ’s look for the real leader ” nonsense.

  But Michael kept silent. Of all people, he, the one who had organized the gathering, the one who had been behind the only real set of rules we had so far, he kept silent. And he was push ing this to the limit : speaking no word, making no sound —just listening, and listening, and looking at the faces—some of them quite red—and just not talking. And he pushed it to the point where he was explicitly asked to speak up by several people. Because not hearing his opinion on a matter like this , it was just . . . well, it just didn ’t feel right. He ’s a rotten bastard, he ’s scum of the earth, he ’s a pig, he ’s all that . . . but you still want to know what he thinks.

  As it turned out, he did have some thoughts to share. And once he had shared th o se thoughts the argument was over. Although it wasn ’t rocket science, the thing he said. It was a slam-dunk. Yet no one had the guts or brains —or both —to go for it . Until he did.

  You’re right, our world has changed, Michael said, his words as crisp and unhurried as ever. But not in the way we ’ve been talking about this. It ’s not about fake or not fake . I t ’s not about being set up or not being set up. It ’s much simpler than all that. Up until a couple of hours ago everyone was playing for himself. We all know that. All the way until 4:00 p.m. today we had one law : the Law of the Jungle. Now, whether we like it or not, this is no longer true. We ’re all in the same boat.

  All we need now is to pick the helmsman amongst ourselves. Nothing more. We have only twenty hours or so left until the gong sounds. And we don ’t have time anymore for silly games and childish notes. We simp
ly don ’t have that luxury. The real work begins and it begins now. And the most important thing to keep in mind, is this: if we fail and end up with no leader, it is quite possible that our CEOs and presidents will simply send a new set of folks here. We ’re good, but not that tough to replace.

  We have a system already in place and there’s no good reason to change it. In fact, there ’s no single plausible reason to change it and no time left for that even if we wanted to. What we need now is simply to use the same system for our real elections. Put it to use to make a real-life choice. And for those who truly care about their career , this choice may become critical. Because nothing ends tomorrow, as we were told. Tomorrow everything just begins. And it ’s about time we stop all the talking and give everyone a few extra hours. To think. To prepare. To decide. So that tomorrow everyone of us will make a right choice.

  And as we think and cast our votes tomorrow, we’d better choose someone who ’s up to this challenge, who ’s capable of dealing with it, who ’s not only qualified but who is also honestly willing to lead us and who we will follow with no hesitation. You could almost hear the hidden yet well-articulated message in his words: “You ’ve got to choose me. There ’s no one else who can do it.” And that ’s what made the effect of Michael ’s next phrase even more shocking.

  As for me, he said, I’m only going to vote. I withdraw my candidacy.

  “What do you mean, withdraw?” asked a completely confused Brandon .

  “Just that, I ’m out. I ’m not competing for this prize anymore.”

  “You’re kidding, right?”

  “No, I’m not.”

  “You’re out?”

  “Yes, I am,” confirmed Michael.

  This was such an obvious move. You play modest, you pretend to step into the shadow s , you say you ’re not interested. Power 101. A few minutes of group persuasion and he would come back, good as new, ready for the challenge. Nice try.

  But as it turned out, he wasn’t playing modest. He even had a story to back his sudden turn. Can I lead an organization like this? Definitely. Am I sure that I ’d be doing a good job at it? Absolutely. Do I need this now? Not at all. This position is pure administration. It ’s business leadership. It ’s deal -making. It ’s a necessity to comprehend fairly well what ’s going on in ten completely different segments. It ’s an overnight transition from what I ’ve been doing for the last five years to something entirely different. And in all honesty, it is not something I need right now. I ’d be much more delighted to be responsible for the segment that I ’m in today. This is my turf and I know it. Don ’t get me wrong —this is an extremely appealing opportunity. And at some point in my career I might become very interested in a position of this sort. But not yet. Not now. What ’s critical for me today is to make sure we don ’t pick the person who ’s been behind all these coincidences . That ’s my priority.