by Nina Post
“Listen, Tom, would you do something for me? A favor for a former co-worker?”
“A co-worker!” Tom said it like it was the most ridiculous thing he’d heard all day. “Aw, Ms. Driscoll…”
“Kelly.” She kicked the ping-pong back to Kermit. “I want you to sneak into my office and get something for me.”
“Sneak into your office! Oh no, I couldn’t… I wouldn’t even know how to—”
“All you need to do is get Charlotte out of the office in a hurry.”
“Oh, right, sure. No problem.”
“Have someone else get her out of the office,” she said. “Have Dragomir use his master key to get into the office.”
Tom exhaled loudly, intimidated.
“Open her file cabinet, which actually isn’t locked; you wouldn’t even have to jimmy it.”
Tom lowered his voice but sounded no less anxious. “I’m not comfortable with this! I’m not used to this kind of… guile and… subterfuge!”
“And take any files that have to do with the following. Write this down?”
He gave her a resigned sigh. “Hold on… yeah, go ahead.”
She paused slightly after each one so he could write it down. “There are four items. I want 1099 forms for all the vendors. I want contracts for those vendors. I want vendor registration forms for all the vendors. And I want check stubs for those vendors, particularly if they involve forensic accounting. Got it?”
“Yes.”
“Thanks, Tom. I won’t forget it.”
“I’ll be honest with you, Ms. Driscoll—”
“Kelly.”
Tom exhaled loudly. “I don’t know if I can do this. I may have a panic attack.”
“You’ll do fine, Tom.”
“What if I get fired, too?”
“I’ll find you a better job.”
She hung up and went to the kitchen to get some cheese crackers. As she popped a cracker in her mouth (not hungry at all but figuring she should eat something, if only a cracker), it occurred to her what else bothered her: Vassago’s reaction, as though telling him the lap pool was completed got him thinking about things he had to do. Something to do with the new death worm lap pool?
Let them, she thought as she went back to the TV room, sat cross-legged on the sofa and listlessly watched The Cluck Snack Cartoon Hour. Tubiel sat next to her, wearing his pineapple print pajamas.
“Rochel’s trying to find another SP?” she asked.
Tubiel nodded.
“Where are Ilaniel and Dave?”
Tubiel pointed down the hall. She pushed herself off the sofa and took the Goldfish with her, eating them on the way. She found Dave and Ilaniel playing a tabletop game in Mr. Orange’s old office, had a brief talk with them, and walked back to the TV room.
She felt weary and hollow and wanted to be unconscious for a while, so she brushed her teeth and got into bed and tried to do that. After a couple of hours of trying futilely to sleep, her mind refusing to slow down, stubbornly over-clocking and turning things over and over, Kelly sat up and made a call.
“Clucking Along Holdings Flavor Lab Two.”
“Dad.”
“Kelly!”
“Dad, I was fired. I need you to do something for me.”
“Fired! What happened?”
“It doesn’t matter right now. I’m going to have Tom meet you in the lab. He’s going to give you a box, or a few boxes. Whatever he gives you, I want you to take it down to the third parking level and give it to Ilaniel and Dave. Can you do that for me?”
“Well, yes, but—”
“So stay in the lab for an hour, at least.”
“Oh, I’m not going anywhere!” Archie said. “Tell me, have you given more thought to training?”
“What?”
“Spending a little more time down here to learn how to mix the flavors. I don’t mean to be immodest, but I am the best in the world at mixing Cluck Snack flavors, and I would like my knowledge and experience to, well… to go on.”
“I’m hardly a scientist.”
“You’re too young to understand, but when you get to my age, you start thinking about how your life has mattered to the world and, well, I hesitate to use the word legacy, but—”
“As soon as the holiday party is over, OK?”
“Ah, wonderful.”
“Thank you,” she said.
“Anything, my dear.”
Ilaniel and Dave lugged a banker’s box full of files back to the top floor of the old SSI headquarters and set it down on Mr. Black’s desk. Kelly sat in the chair and looked through the files. The SPs, now wearing painters’ overalls, sat down with her.
“Let’s start with the 1099s.” Kelly took out the files that contained those and looked through each one. “This is kind of weird. The only out-of-state vendor for the work Charlotte’s done for Claw & Crutty has a midtown Manhattan address, but look at this.” She held out the paper. “It’s at suite 385297.”
The SPs looked at her questioningly.
“That tells me it’s a PO box or a puppet office.” They brightened, probably picturing an office where puppets work. She hated to disappoint them. “That means it’s a closet. It’s not a real office.”
Their faces fell.
“But always one where puppets secretly work during the night on special, top-secret puppet projects.”
They cheered up.
Kelly read over some papers and shook her head, incredulous at what she saw.
I Cannot Conduct My Life as a Flying Lizard-Dragon Monster
elly found Charlotte’s methods clever but contemptible. No one had ever challenged Charlotte because anyone who indicated any opposition to a forensic accounting company checking the numbers in the background would automatically seem guilty. And on the signature lines on the contract with the forensics vendor, Kelly noticed something odd:
Quantitative Forensic Services
By Quantitative Forensic Services Operations, LLC
By Quantitative Forensic Services (Delaware) LLC
By Albert VanOsher, its Managing Member
The domicile of one of the corporations was located in Missouri, and there was nothing available about it online. She called the Secretary of State’s office in Missouri to find out who the officers and directors were. One of the officers, the secretary, was Jeffrey Talbot, and Talbot was Charlotte’s last name.
It was a shell, with nothing behind it.
She felt relieved, angry, betrayed. She wanted revenge. She also kind of wanted to laugh but didn’t have the energy.
Tubiel sat cross-legged next to her and put his finger on the Claw & Crutty business card amidst all her papers.
“What?”
He tapped the card and smiled.
“This isn’t about your personalized amenity plan, is it?”
With an expression that indicated she was being obtuse but he was still fond of her anyway, Tubiel took out Becky’s business card from his jacket pocket and tossed it over his shoulder.
“So much for the personalized plan. Then what?”
He pantomimed holding up a phone to his ear.
“Call them?”
He nodded and gave her a bigger smile.
“What’s the point.”
Tubiel whistled for Kermit. A moment later, Kermit came over and Tubiel stood facing him. Tubiel pointed to each of Kelly’s piles of paper. Kermit scratched his chin, pretending to think it over.
Tubiel pointed more emphatically at the papers and whistled again. Firiel came over, holding a plushie fungus. Kermit pretended to think about it a little more, gave Tubiel a smile and nod, and reached out to shake his hand with three firm pumps.
Tubiel turned to look at her and gestured as though to say, Do you get it now?
“All right,” she finally conceded. “I get it. I’ll call them.” Visibly relieved, Tubiel sent Kermit and Firiel back to what they were doing.
Her next call was to Claw & Crutty. She talked to a receptionist and demanded to see
either Claw or Crutty right away. When the receptionist tried to schedule her for the last day of the following week, she briefly explained, at a high-level, why Claw or Crutty would want to talk to her that day.
The Claw & Crutty corporate offices hovered over Pothole City from a high floor of an office tower a couple of blocks away from Amenity Tower. Kelly had managed to pull herself together enough to pass for a capable professional. She had color-printed handouts and graphs and another file, an even more important one.
In one of the small conference rooms, she met with Mr. Crutty and his assistant. Nice touch, she thought. Really rubbing it in.
As he tapped his claws on the table, she started with her case for an assistant manager, showing her updates of Roger’s analysis through the course of eleven slides. When she was done, Mr. Crutty nodded and said in a gravelly voice, “I’ll consider it and get back to you.” With the help of his assistant, no doubt.
Kelly put out her hand. “Mr. Crutty, your office has put me off on this matter for months. I would really appreciate an answer right now. The analysis clearly indicates a—”
“Ms. Driscoll, I don’t like being hurried.”
She didn’t like feeling that she was always struggling to keep up with the million things that had to be maintained or fixed in Amenity Tower. She didn’t like getting fired before the zombie infection or lobby plant situation or new amenities situation or new lap pool was fully resolved. And she really didn’t like Charlotte getting rewarded while she was punished. As Crutty started to leave again, she said, “I’m not done yet.”
He turned, surprised.
“You sent one of your fixers, Charlotte Talbot, to bring up the numbers at Amenity Tower,” she said. “As you may know,” she said in a wry tone, knowing he knew, “Amenity Tower was nearly destroyed and had to undergo extensive rebuilding. The reserve took a hit, and Claw and Crutty sent Charlotte in to get things on the right track. But things were already on the right track. And bringing her in doesn’t improve your buildings—it only damages your reputation.”
Crutty put a clawed hand on the back of a chair. “What are you talking about?”
“Charlotte has been embezzling money from every Claw & Crutty property you’ve sent her to since you hired her seven years ago,” she told him. “She’s been using a vendor called Quantitative Forensic Services as the forensic accounting firm that she says is working quietly in the background while she does her work. What it actually does in the background is funnel money into a shell account.”
She wondered whether she needed to explicitly state that Charlotte had screwed over Claw & Crutty and their properties. It should be clear enough—but it couldn’t hurt. He could be thinking about dinner plans. “She’s defrauding you and your properties.”
She dropped some files on the table. “If you look at what I’ve highlighted on these 1099 forms, these vendor registration forms,” she dropped those next to the first pile, “these vendor contracts,” she dropped those next to the first two, “and these vendor registration forms, you’ll see without a doubt that what I’m saying is true, and considering that she invaded my office with a plenipotentiary rubric from you, and fired me, I would like that to be removed from my work record, whatever the outcome.”
Crutty perused the file. She waited.
“This is highly irregular, Ms. Driscoll.”
“I thought so.”
Crutty made a harrumphing noise as he leaned over the table and shuffled the papers around as he perused them. Minutes later, in his slow, deep voice, he said, “And how did this initially come to your attention?”
“Roger Balbi suspected that someone funneled money from the properties. I read it in his journals. And I did my own work on it.”
“How did you get all of this?” Crutty asked, gesturing to the files.
“They’re from my office,” she said, leaving it at that.
He rubbed his chin and took out a laptop from his briefcase. “Roger’s journals,” he murmured. He sat down with the laptop and its separate keyboard with oversized keys and typed for a moment after logging in, keeping his eyes on the screen. “You are currently working as interim manager at Amenity Tower.”
“That’s right.”
“Yet you haven’t, it seems, attempted to get promoted.”
“No.”
“Why is that?”
“Because of Roger.”
“Roger Balbi?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
She tensed up even more. “Because when he was promoted to regional manager, he… uh…” Did they know? They had to know, right?
“Ascended to a new form?”
They did know. She relaxed, slightly. “Yes. I didn’t want to risk a promotion. I like the form I’m in.”
“You know that that doesn’t automatically happen.”
“I don’t know that. All I know is that Roger ascended to a higher position in the Claw and Crutty corporate ladder as a giant, flying lizard-dragon. And I cannot conduct my life as a flying lizard-dragon monster. I have people I care about.”
Something she thought she lost and could never have again. “I have—” Did she? “—a boyfriend. A father. People to take care of. I like to do my job in my current form.”
“As a rule, we don’t discuss this, you understand,” Crutty said.
She waited.
“But between us, Roger lobbied hard for his ascension. We don’t do that kind of thing as a matter of course. He knew that it was a possibility, that we had rewarded certain employees in the past with ascension, and he made his case for it, similar to what you’re doing here now with an assistant manager.”
“I see. But there’s another reason I wasn’t promoted.”
“What’s that?”
“Roger was widely beloved as building manager of Amenity Tower. He left a strong legacy and it’s been hard to fill his shoes.”
“The next manager will find it difficult to fill your shoes.”
She deflated. “So I’m still fired?”
“On the contrary.”
Her spirits tentatively lifted.
“I think it’s time we took you off ‘interim’ and made you the permanent building manager at Amenity Tower.”
Kelly sat back, speechless. Crutty tilted his head and considered her, so she figured she should sit straight and say something before he assumed she was some kind of simpleton. “Well.”
“Is this acceptable to you?”
A rush of relief surged through her, but she didn’t want to say yes yet. She had things to negotiate first. “I would need a raise. What’s the standard differential between the interim and the permanent position?”
“About twenty thousand a year.”
“Can you make it twenty-five?”
“We can probably do that.”
“What about Charlotte?”
“We will relieve her of her post and suspend her until our attorneys look into the matter.”
“May I suggest that you do not do that? It would make Claw and Crutty look bad and erode your properties’ confidence in you.”
He thought about it. “We have an apartment building in Yellowknife, in the Northwest Territories of Canada. We could transfer her, and keep a close eye on her from here. In fact, we’ll remove her today.”
Kelly smiled. “‘I’d also like an assistant manager. I believe I provided enough support for my request earlier.”
“Do you have someone in mind for the position?” Crutty asked.
“I do.”
“Why don’t you go back to work on Monday morning as building manager, and give the good news to your new assistant manager.”
Kelly felt muscles relax she hadn’t even known were tense, mainly in her face and shoulders.
Crutty stood and put out his huge clawed hand. Kelly tentatively shook it, avoiding the claws. “Congratulations, Ms. Driscoll.”
“Thank you, Mr. Crutty. I appreciate it.”
She left the office
tower feeling lighter than she had in a long time. She wasn’t a stand-in, a stunt manager until the real thing came along. She’d gotten her stamp of validation, a nice raise, an assistant manager, and her nemesis was banished to northwest Canada. Now the main thing she had to worry about was the board’s plan to unbind themselves, escape Amenity Tower, and open portals to other dimensions—something she hadn’t been keeping a close enough eye on lately.
On the walk back home, snow crunching underfoot, she got a call from one of the cicada brothers, who was displeased the wire transfer hadn’t gone through yet. “We’re going into the ground on Tuesday,” he said. “Tuesday! I have a family!”
Charlotte must have taken her off the authorized list for the bank. “I’m so sorry,” she said. “I’ll have to call the bank on Monday. I think someone at the office accidentally canceled the transfer.” In the way that wasn’t accidental at all. But she didn’t want to tell them she was fired.
At home, she changed back into her pajamas and got into bed, because despite the good news, the blow still hurt, and Af’s absence still hurt. Besides, it was the weekend, and she wanted to try to build herself back up again. The holiday party she organized would go on without her.
She propped up some pillows and watched Le Samourai. Tubiel came in and sat on the bed, and so did Firiel, and Achiel, and the rest of the SPs until she could barely see the screen, but she didn’t mind. When her phone rang, she checked it, hoping it was Af, but it was Tom. Against her better judgment, she picked up, in case he needed help with something.
“Hey, Tom.”
“We need you at the holiday party!” He sounded on the verge of total panic. “I know you were fired and all, but Charlotte isn’t here, and this will be a disaster without you!”
“Well, the good news is, Charlotte is out and I was reinstated. And the ‘interim’ was dropped. But Claw and Crutty told me to come back in on Monday. I’m not sure it’s gone through yet.”
“That’s great! But look, it doesn’t matter whether it’s gone through or not—you’ve gotta be here for this!”
She hesitated.
“Please!”
