Maggie took over the call. She didn’t like watching him struggle, and clearly whatever the caller was saying was bad, and Ro didn’t look like he was going to be able to salvage it, or even reply.
Immediately, her right ear was hammered with shouting in a Teissian language.
“I’m sorry,” she said in her politest sing-song phone voice. Ro snatched off his earpiece and threw it down onto the desk, bolting to his feet and storming away. Maggie continued, keeping her eyes on him. “There has been a technical fault on your line. Please hold to be reconnected.”
She muted the bastard. He could take a few minutes to calm down. She tried to see where Ro had gone, but he had disappeared. He had left the department, so he could have been anywhere in the building. She sighed, and Lucy gave her an inquisitive look, indicating Ro’s empty seat with her eyes.
Maggie waved it off. “Asshole caller,” she said as if it was nothing, but Ro’s departure had been a bit more dramatic than she could really cover for. She hoped he was alright. Lucy looked sceptical, but didn’t press.
Maggie took a deep breath, preparing to do battle, and unmuted the call. “How can I help?” she asked sweetly.
The caller was clearly steaming, but he calmed down when he realised he was speaking to a human woman now, and Maggie actually got through the call without any problems. The guy was unquestionably an entitled prick, blustering over the slightest delay or inconvenience, but Maggie smooth-talked him with promises that it would all be sorted out, and that he could apply for new accommodation with that team. He never told her what was so “unacceptable” about his housing allocation, but she didn’t ask. She wanted him off the phone, so as soon as she’d identified whose problem he was going to be, she wrapped it up.
She created a case file for him, including a warning that he had abused one of her staff, and sent it off to Accommodation. Then she opened an email to Derek outlining what had happened, keeping it extremely brief, and included the file number and the recording of the call. That was standard procedure. If Derek took it seriously instead of just filing it away, he would need to get an interpreter to go on record with a translation, and Maggie had to admit, she wanted to know what had been said. She hoped he would keep her in the loop on his own, but if not, she might risk looking nosey and ask. She was pretty sure Ro wouldn’t tell her if she asked him, but if it affected his work, she needed to know.
He hadn’t come back yet.
She wondered if she should go and look for him. Maybe they weren’t friends anymore, but this was work related. No one knew about it except for her and Derek, and maybe it was naïve, but she thought he would prefer to talk to her about it than the big boss.
When he had been gone almost ten minutes and she thought she was going to have to go look for him before someone noticed and said something, he came back. She opened her mouth to say something, ask if he was alright, but the way he threw himself back into his chair and the scowl on his face made her close it again. He was furious. She would let him pretend it hadn’t happened, at least in front of the rest of the team.
Then Derek came to get her.
“Guys, can we have a quick chat in my office?” he said in that hyper-pleasant, overly-friendly way managers have of sugar-coating something you’re not going to want to agree to.
Maggie knew she couldn’t say no, so she pushed her chair away from her desk, straightening her skirt. Ro looked at her, obviously a little alarmed, but he followed without comment.
They walked across the department floor to Derek’s office, Maggie trying to look innocent. Derek closed the door behind them. He swivelled his screen around so they could see Maggie’s email with the attached audio file. Maggie recognised it immediately, but Ro leant forward to read it, and she saw his hands clench behind his back as he realised what she had done.
“So what happened here?” he asked, perching on the corner of his desk rather than sitting on any of the chairs in the room.
“Nothing,” Maggie said. She spoke first so she could try to communicate to Ro that she was on his side. She’d cover it up if that was what he wanted. She wasn’t snitching, just trying to help. “There was an abusive caller. We all get them. You asked that we send them to you when it happens,” she said, shrugging as if it was nothing.
“Mm-hmm, okay,” Derek said, nodding along. “Ro, you want to tell me what was said?”
They both looked at him as they waited to hear how he would explain it. It was then that Maggie realised she really didn’t know what had happened. She had assumed the fault lay with the caller, but she hadn’t understood a single word of the conversation either. She didn’t even know what language it was in.
Ro cleared his throat with a rasp. “It is as Maggie said. The caller was… abusive.” He didn’t sound convincing, even to Maggie.
Derek’s face gave nothing away. “What did he say? Sorry to make you repeat it, but it’s my duty to investigate these things and protect my staff.”
For a moment Ro didn’t say anything. Maggie took what she hoped was a subtle step towards him. She wanted to take his hand but she knew she couldn’t do that, even if they had still been on good terms. She still wanted him to know she was on his side though.
“He realised I am Balin,” he said at last.
“Okay, and then what happened?” Derek pressed.
“He was Balor,” Ro said.
“I’m afraid I don’t understand what you’re getting at, Ro,” Derek said.
Maggie was starting to get a bad feeling about where this might be going. She knew Ro had a problem with Balor but she had never known why. It looked like the Balor also had a problem with him.
“He tried to use that to order me to do what he wanted,” Ro said, sounding tense. It was clear he was dodging around something, some important piece of information he didn’t want to explain or admit to.
“Why would that make a difference? Are you saying this was racially motivated?”
Ro appeared to lock his jaw and fix his eyes on the floor.
Derek sighed. “Maggie, do you know anything about this?”
Maggie shook her head. “No,” she said hurriedly.
“Ro… You understand in this case I can’t accept your translation, I will need to ask someone else?” Derek said.
Ro looked up, alarmed. “Who?”
“If this is in Balin, how about Kez? You’re friends, aren’t you? And then we could keep it in the department.”
“The call was in Balor,” Ro corrected him.
“Oh right. But you’ve taken calls from Balor before, haven’t you? And you haven’t had problems with them?”
Ro hesitated again. “The other Balor have been polite, yes,” he confirmed.
“Alright then.” Derek got up and Ro moved to stop him.
“Don’t make Kez listen to the call,” he said.
“Why not?”
“It is not good to listen to, for a Balin,” Ro told him.
Derek sighed, aggrieved, as if this was a minefield he didn’t feel equipped to navigate.
Maggie knew he had to hear a translation of the call in order to investigate properly, and he definitely had to investigate now that it looked like his employees could be suffering racial abuse at work. If the mother tongue menu option was opening the Teissian staff to racial discrimination, it needed to be revised immediately. If Derek did nothing, he could be in serious trouble if it came out later. But he couldn’t trust Ro’s translation because he might be lying to cover up a mistake of his own. He couldn’t ask another Balin because Ro was telling him it would be upsetting, which meant there was no way he could ask a Balor.
His best and really his only option was to put in an official request to Language Services for one of their people to have a look at it, so that if the translation turned out to be false or inaccurate, they would be the liable ones, not Derek. But that would make the whole thing so much more official. He wouldn’t be able to write it off as a one-time thing, not without writing a r
eport and doing loads of paperwork on it anyway. If it went to Language Services, it would be out of the Enquiries containment field and it could be gossiped about throughout the building, eventually reaching the ears of Derek’s bosses.
It was an awful pain in the ass for one phone call.
“Are you sure?” Derek said. “I know you two are friends, but Kez is a professional as well. Even just an informal second opinion could go a long way to assessing this issue.”
Ro seemed to hesitate. It was obvious what Derek wanted, and Ro hadn’t even held his job for a month yet. One of the team leaders might have been able to put their foot down, but Ro clearly didn’t know if he would be risking his job by arguing.
“Warn him first,” Ro said, and Derek nodded and left the office to go and get Kez.
“Are you okay?” Maggie asked as soon as they were alone. “I’m so sorry, this shouldn’t have happened to you. I didn’t want to cause trouble, it’s just procedure.” She bit her lip, worried that this would make him dislike her even more.
Instead he smiled at her, one of his tight, polite, fake smiles. “It’s fine, Maggie. You did nothing wrong.”
“But-”
The door opened again and Maggie cut herself off. Derek brought Kez into the room and shut the door. Kez looked suspiciously at Ro, obviously wondering what was going on.
“I was hoping you could help us out with something, Kez,” Derek said. “Ro had an incident with a caller earlier, and we were just wondering if you would mind giving us a translation of the call? I’ve been told it could be upsetting.”
Kez looked away from Derek as if ignoring him, and asked Ro something in Balin. Ro answered quietly. Derek interrupted. This would be pointless if they were allowed to confer in secret, in case Ro was telling Kez what to say.
“Well, Kez?” he said, raising his voice to cut them off.
Kez shrugged. “Play it,” he said.
Derek reached across to tap his computer and get the call to play. Kez snorted at the first words, identifying the language as Balor. Maggie watched, and listened to the strange language coming through the speakers. It was fascinating how she could almost understand what was being said from Ro’s tone alone. It was the same pleasant, rhythmic phone voice they all used, his smooth clear pronunciation doing him credit.
The caller was getting angry and loud, drowning out Ro’s attempts to talk him down. Kez looked annoyed, but he hadn’t reacted as if anything being said was anything more than the normal levels of rude. Then something was said that made him hiss, his clawed hands flexing suddenly and his crest shooting up. Derek and Maggie shared a worried look. Kez growled, and looked at Ro, speaking quickly and angrily in Balin, gesturing to the computer furiously. Ro replied, obviously emotional but less animated than Kez. Derek stopped the playback.
“Kez? Can you explain what was said?”
Kez openly ignored Derek and continued his argument with Ro. It looked to Maggie from their gestures and tones as if Kez was berating him, and Ro was taking a “what else could I have done?” stance.
“Kez?” Derek said, raising his voice again.
Kez looked at him and snorted almost like a bull. “The caller is not happy with his accommodation because it is near others who are not Balor. Ro is polite and follows the script, I tell you that,” he said, pointing at Derek, still angry.
“Okay, and can you confirm that the caller is being discriminatory?”
“Heh?”
“Did he say anything racially offensive to Ro?”
“You mean because he is Balin? Yes, he tried to use that to order Ro to move him.”
“What does Ro’s race have to do with it?” Maggie asked, jumping in when she probably shouldn’t have.
Both the Balin looked at her, Kez still steaming. “Balor think they are better than everyone,” Kez said, but she could tell from his voice that he was hiding something. She’d heard it from Ro enough times, back when they were still talking. It was too careful, too clever, answering a question she didn’t ask.
“What did he say that made you so angry?” she said. There had been a clear point that had made Kez lose it, some inflammatory phrase or suggestion. That would be what Derek was hunting for, confirmation that some kind of slur was used. Something like that could get the caller blacklisted immediately, and that was what Maggie wanted. If the same person called the Incoming Enquiries line and selected the mother tongue option, he was guaranteed to get Ro again. She didn’t want that to happen. She didn’t want Ro to ever hear that voice again.
Kez snarled, but it didn’t feel like it was directed at her. “I will not say it. We have left that word behind us.”
“Does it have a translation in English?” she said.
Kez huffed. “Why? So you can use it?”
Ro snapped at him in Balin and they started off again, talking over each other. She had never seen Ro so angry before, his eyes narrowed and the pink in his cheeks drawn long in a scowl, his clawed feet scratching at the carpet.
“Guys! Guys!” Derek stopped them. “Of course none of us are going to use it. But if the caller did, then it’s proof of racial targeting, okay?”
Ro turned, pinning Maggie with his eyes, freezing her to the spot. His black eyes looked as blank as glass, his tone empty as if they had never been friends.
“In your language?” he said, his accent coming through just a little as he switched back from his mother tongue. Maggie didn’t miss that he had drawn a line between them. His hands balled into fists at his side. “You would say ‘slave’.”
Chapter 12
There was a stunned silence, until Kez laughed bitterly, waving his hand at the shocked human side of the room as he said something to Ro, who grunted in reply, releasing Maggie from his mesmerising hold on her.
Slave? It echoed round Maggie’s head, but she still couldn’t understand what he meant by it. Why would the Balor call him that? It didn’t make sense. It couldn’t possibly be literal, could it? She knew Ro stayed away from Balor, and that he had never talked about his life on Teiss, but… It just wasn’t sinking in.
“Alright,” Derek said, his voice heavy. “I’ll report this. I’ll put in a job to Language Services for an official translation. There’ll be an investigation into the new menu system and the caller will be blacklisted. Ro, I apologise again that this happened. You’re free to go, and don’t worry about finishing today. You can go home now if you want. Maggie, good job today.”
Maggie recognised the dismissal for what it was. Derek would take it from there, but if he was requesting an investigation, he wouldn’t be allowed to talk about it in detail until it concluded. Kez opened the door and they filed out silently. Ro aimed for his desk with his head down, so Kez gave his shoulder a squeeze and went back to Requisitions. Maggie followed Ro.
As he shut down his computer, she made a snap decision and did the same. Ben glanced at them, but luckily couldn’t say anything because he was on a call. Maggie noticed Lucy raise her eyebrows. The team could talk after they’d left, she didn’t care about the gossip. There’d been plenty already.
Ro strode out of Enquiries and Maggie quickly got her things together and jogged after him, catching up to him in the corridor and reaching for his arm to stop him.
“Ro, wait,” she said.
He turned and faced her but didn’t say anything, looking at her hand as if he wanted her to remove it.
“Let me buy you a drink,” she said, taking her hand back and adjusting her bag on her shoulder to cover the motion.
“Why?” he said.
“Because.” She still couldn’t put her reason into words, but she couldn’t just let him go home alone.
He nodded as if he understood. “You pity me,” he said.
“I want to talk to you,” she said, her frustration at the days of silence slipping out. “I’m sick of not talking to you,” she mumbled.
He stared at her, making her feel like he was studying her, like she was a sample in a petri
dish he couldn’t make sense of.
He sighed in defeat. “I don’t feel like any more choba,” he said, starting to walk again.
She kept up with him, smiling. “I didn’t mean that, I meant a real drink. I know a place that’s open near here.”
“Why, Maggie?” he asked again.
She shrugged. “It seems appropriate,” she said.
They left the building and Maggie led him a few blocks down to a sports bar and grill. It was always dark on the inside and there were plenty of tables that were tucked out of the way, as if the place was deliberately aiming for the misanthrope, day-drinker crowd. It was a bit before four pm, so there weren’t any diners, just a few people sat watching the game at the bar. One guy eyeballed Ro as they walked in, but soon turned back to the screen and his beer.
Maggie led them to a booth at the back, and Ro slid in opposite her. A waitress put two glasses of water down for them, and Maggie got the drinks menu. When they were alone again, Maggie spoke first.
“Please let me apologise for how I acted in your apartment.”
Ro looked at her but didn’t say anything, and his expression gave her no clues.
“It was… immature of me, and I never meant to imply anything. I know you wouldn’t really have… done anything.”
Ro made a small hum, as if he was curious or surprised, and picked up his menu. “You were right to leave. As I said, I wasn’t myself at that time. I deeply regret my behaviour.”
“Wait, are you apologising to me?” Maggie said.
“Yes.”
“But it was my fault.”
The New Guy (Office Aliens Book 2) Page 9
