Project: Evil - The Counter Proposal part 1

Brian stepped out of the shower and grabbed a towel, rubbing vigorously to dry himself off. He felt great; the project seemed to be running smoothly, he’d had a banging night down the pub, lain in bed until ten and had the rest of the day off. It couldn’t get better.

Wrapping the towel around him, he entered his bedroom and noticed that he’s received a text message. Picking up his phone he opened the text.

‘Just picked up your voicemails. Sorry for the delay, been tied up. Meet at Starbucks today at eleven. Pussy Golightly.’ His towel dropped, mirroring his jaw. He’d assumed that when Daw had said she had been dealt with, that he wouldn’t ever hear from her again. Daw had said something about a severance package, which in O’Feld Industries’ HR department tended to have a more sinister meaning than in other companies. But being tied up also seemed consistent, so perhaps she was just resourceful. Looking at the clock, Brian realised he didn’t have much time.

At five past eleven Brian entered the Starbucks, having watched it from across the street for ten minutes. It had occurred to him that O’Feld, or more likely Daw, might have set a trap for him, to test his loyalty. He’d asked Daw previously if disloyalty was frowned upon.

*

‘No, it’s expected. We recruit evil minded cheats as a policy. You’ll be approached by the competition, who’ll offer you the moon,’ he’d said, returning to the task he’d had in hand when Brian had tracked him down. He was firing a temp for incompetence. The blast of the man-sized gun rocked the room as the temp scored a perfect parabola through the sky. As Brian watched the sight he continued to press Daw.

‘And you permit this to go on?’ he asked, surprised at the attitude. Daw shrugged.

‘We do it, we’re not hypocrites,’ he said, then adding, ‘actually, come to think of it, we are. It’s another core trait we use in recruitment.’

‘But you allow it to go on, let staff leave after being offered the moon?’ Daw shrugged.

‘We can hardly offer more than the moon, but we tend to match the offer,’ he said, putting his field glasses down, content that the temp had sunk deep enough into the mud banks of the Thames Estuary to never resurface. This went totally against Brian’s expectations; Daw recognised the look, so continued, ‘we scatter their body parts over the moon’s surface whenever we have an evil project going that way. Until then we keep them in cold storage,’ he said, picking up a phone, indicating that the conversation was over.

*

The Starbucks was busy, with everything from teenage mums and their mandatory five children, through middle aged couples sipping over-priced lattes made from beans harvested by Caribbean uninhabitants, right up to a few octogenarians scattered around the room nursing the cheapest drink possible and reading the complimentary newspapers. Nobody closely resembled the photo of Pussy Golightly that Brian had looked at all those months ago when he’d spotted the job advert for a project manager. Or even distantly resembled, Brian decided. Ordering a large mug of coffee flavoured froth he found a table with a spare seat, so that Pussy would have somewhere to sit – he might work for one of the evilest organisations to come out of Basildon, but he knew how to treat a lady who’d responded to a voicemail request for sex. There was no way he was going to let her stand while they shared a coffee.  Brian was startled when one of the octogenarians came over and sat down opposite.

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The characters, companies and places referred to in Project: Evil are fictitious and any resemblance to people, companies, businesses or places is entirely coincidental

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