Fade to Blink - A Quantum Date Ch. 01

January 32

"Quantum barrels," he said over the loud hum.

"Quantum barrels?" I asked, not sure that I heard him.

He laughed. "Yeah, 'barrels' is about right. I guess we do have some of those, but no, quantum bearings," he corrected me.

We were standing on an observation balcony, overlooking a handful of workstations scattered in front of a wall of floor-to-ceiling windows. Behind those was a well-lit, pristine lab, its polished concrete floor reflecting the overhead fluorescents. Set back from the glass were a row of worksurfaces, and behind those, lining the back of the lab was a wall of large battleship grey doors, like the ones in my father's restaurant. "They look like walk-in freezers," I suggested.

He laughed again. "I know, it's not very interesting from here," and he paused as one of the doors opened and a bunny-suited figure emerged, the suit's edges fuzzy from vapor. Even through the glass, the noise increased until the tech closed the doors. "But that's ultimately what you're working on."

We stood for a moment watching the tech unsuit and sit down at a worksurface. Then Peter turned to confirm I'd seen enough. What more was there to see? A room of workstations in front of a wall of walk in freezers. And this was the focus of a $1B "startup." We ascended the elevators to the first floor.

"Hey, I know you literally just walked in the door a couple of hours ago, but it might be good for you to attend the corporate all hands in a little bit. You probably didn't even have a chance to break open your workstation. Just come down to the auditorium, HQ01.1.1 by 11:30. If nothing else, there's free lunch. Oh, wait. Let me introduce you to your dev buddy...Marybeth?" He turned to a woman walking past us. "I wanted to introduce you two."

I looked at a woman about my age, long hair, tall and just this side of gangly with a disarming smile. She extended her hand and gave me a warm welcome. At least, that's what I understood it to be.

"Marybeth can help you interpret what our leadership is actually saying. Beware the TLAs!" Peter raised his fist, flashed us a smile and left the two of us.

"So," Marybeth looked at a clock, sharing a snarky expression at Peter's back. "We've got 30 minutes before the good seats get taken. You been to your station yet?" Seeing my reaction, she put her hand on my shoulder and turned me the opposite direction. "Let's go check it out."

She kept up a running patter as we walked down hallways, up stairs and across open offices until we landed at my coordinates. "Coordinates? Really?" I cocked my head to a green street sign on a white metal pole at the intersection of my row and column.

"I know, right? You'll see a lot of geography around here. Your first orientation is this afternoon, right?" She shook her head. "I don't know why they do that, scheduling orientation after you've been here for half a day...anyway, take a look around."

I looked out across the room and saw a matrix of desks and workstations, interrupted at regular intervals by the street signs.

"It's meant to be ironic," she confided. "You know," she continued, mimicking an informercial, "MEI collapses our classic notions of time and space." She smiled and shrugged. "Anyway, here's you."

January 33

"You with me?" He had to raise his voice to be heard over the white noise in the Concentrator.

Jimmie's voice sounded strained, worried. I nodded, looking around for the umpteenth time. Still all white; still no visible seams. Anywhere. The floor met the walls with a curved surface, the material transitioning continuously from horizontal to vertical. At least as far as I could tell. It hurt my eyes to try and focus. When I had started to kneel down and get a closer look, Jimmie practically shouted at me to get back into position. This doesn't look anything like what I saw in the simulator.

His eyes darted from the gadget on his wrist, to the larger box on his belt, to the ceiling, and back to my face, but no matter where I looked, the room appeared the same. The light was competing with the walls for a gold medal in strangeness: there were no fixtures to cast shadows; even at our feet I could barely distinguish a change in hue. It was everywhere, soft, unfocused, almost uniform, but not quite. When I tried to stare at a brighter spot it skittered away, or dissolved, forming again in my peripheral vision. I had to close my eyes; I was getting nauseated.

"You okay?"

I blinked them open and stared at him, the noise from the room beginning to grate on me. Skittish. He scanned my face, his eyes traveling down to my feet. I shivered from that look. I knew that look; at least I thought I did. Did that make sense, here? Now? Hunger. Desire. My impulse to bend my knees battling with Jimmie's shout to stay standing. Fuck me and his training! Everything told me I should be melting, dropping to the floor, the orange blob rising from my gut; everything except my own near-panic, my heart slamming in my chest from what we were about to do, and Jimmie's expression. Fear? Panic? As well as I knew him, I had never seen this before.

I looked over his shoulder for the entrance: I knew it was right behind him, but from where I was standing, just a few feet away, I couldn't see it. Nothing. I focused back on Jimmie: face, eyes, mouth, face, chest, hands, chest, penis, pubic hair, penis, face, pubic hair, skin glistening with glops of gel. I couldn't stop flicking between the dark patch below his waist and the wild expression on his face. I had no templates for this. I giggled. There couldn't possibly be a template for this! His expression was...panicked. That was the most likely emotion. But was he angry? Anxious? In all the months we'd been together, Fuck!, it had been almost a year...our anniversary was coming up. Would we even be together to celebrate it? I had never seen him this...loud. That was all I could read: full on, screaming, loud.

"Okay. Okay. Any moment."

I looked down at our feet again, the light's weirdness continuing to fascinate and nauseate me. No discernible shadows at our feet. It hurt to stare at the floor too long, my nipples and breasts a welcomed landmark to focus on instead, and just past them my own pubic triangle, my too-wide hips. The globs of gel on my skin glinting back the light. A soft rumble moved through me. Not a sound, hardly even a vibration. I snapped my eyes back to his to see if he'd felt it.

He nodded slightly, murmuring, his lips moving, but with the sound so loud I couldn't make out anything intelligible. I suspected he was trying to calm down, knowing his panic was contagious, but he was definitely not succeeding. I giggled again; the situation was so outside anything I had experience with. Calm? How could he even tell if I was anxious? I knew my face was stony. But, I supposed, after almost a year, he probably could read me much better than I could read him. Maybe he could see my heart pumping through a vein in my forehead. I glanced down again at my chest, looking to see if any of the blood vessels, so clear beneath my skin, were telegraphing my panic, surprised at seeing the smears of gel everywhere.

Scrabbling again for a template, reminding myself there was no template for this. I was six years old: the confusion, disorientation, the scrambling for anything to hold on to, for something stable. How could there be a template? Stripped naked in the middle of MEI, our clothes abandoned in a closet, standing in a room without any exit, with a colleague, and lover don't forget, yes, and lover, who was probably suffering some kind of psychological break, what fucking template could I possibly have for this?

As confusing as it all was, I never questioned why we were here, never distrusted our purpose, or Jimmie's intentions. I giggled again, this time loud enough for him to hear. He snapped his eyes at me, but with his volume so high I couldn't begin to tell what his new expression was saying. Trust him!? That was hardly a reliable 'constant.' Unreliable, but the best I had in the moment. Would I see my parents again? Would they recognize me as me? Did I have any regrets for my life? If I hadn't flickered already, I would have thought this was the end.

I gave a mental shrug. Either this would work, or it wouldn't. But this had to work. If it didn't, the committee would have to try something else. But even if it does work...The thought flashed through me and I stared back at Jimmie, that question still unanswered, or, the only answer I'd been given still unsatisfying: it wouldn't stop. They'd be doing it over and over again. But If it didn't work...the same result. I left the loop and closed my eyes.

And then I felt another vibration, much stronger this time. A roiling in my gut like...like one of those bright ball-like fireworks all pinpoint light, followed by a bass drum wave, but not quite. And then Jimmie's hands shot out to grab my upper arms, pulling me into a tight embrace, his fingers sliding on the gel.

"Now. Hold on to me as tight as you can!"

I tried to squeeze him as hard as he was squeezing me, the gel slippery, giving me no place to hold onto. My upper body strength completely inadequate for the job, adrenaline succeeding where months of gym visits had failed. I felt the rumble a third time, between the pain of his arms pressing against my shoulder blades, my breasts squashed against his chest, his chin gripping my shoulder and his ankles trying to wrap around mine, my heart skipping beats or having too many, my thoughts scrambling even more, if that was possible, and then semi-focusing. I squeezed him back, mimicking his efforts as best I could: arms against back, chin on shoulder, pubic bone pushing against his. I hesitated, worrying I might be smashing his penis, but he pushed back against me. I couldn't move my feet. And throughout it all the sliminess of the gel. Welp. That's your fault. Or your genius. We'll see in a moment.

And then I couldn't talk. I wasn't sure exactly what I couldn't do. I wasn't sure exactly what I was. And then it all turned right-side out. It was the strongest flicker I'd ever experienced. The room might have faded to black for an instant. Or maybe not.

Mid-March 32 (Mid-90)

I thought about that first day a lot. And not just that first day, but the whole hiring process. I mean, okay, I get that a company like MEI wants to hire the best and brightest. And I didn't think for a moment they'd even ask me for an interview. Just the application process was unlike anything else I'd gone through. Three different assessments: technical (some bullshit software thing which was a breeze), arithmetic/logic (also stupid) and personality/psychological (which took almost 30 minutes to complete). That last one concerned me. Would my brain weirdness be a blocker or an enabler? Imagine my surprise when I got a call. And the interview process. I was surprised I wasn't dehydrated by the end just from sweating. I was shocked when they made me an offer. My mother wasn't. Of course. But she hadn't been through the grueling process. Her breezy confidence in my abilities...it bordered on irritation. Didn't she know by now how fucking difficult this shit is for me?!

And, yeah, that first day. There was so much I didn't know; so much Peter was saying during the tour that I just didn't understand. The new hire orientation came afterward, and sure, it had covered all the basics; the manager tour was supposed to provide the details, fill in the gaps. But that's not how my head works. I just collect everything, and wait for it to come together. That day wasn't any different. Now, months later I understand a lot more, but there's still plenty I'm clueless about. Back then? I laugh now at how utterly naïve I was. That's okay. I'm used to it. It's how it's always been with me.

Like a flip-book, I skipped forward from day one through the next several months: the usual compliancy training, training on the tool set and environment, more compliancy training -- security. So much training, I smiled at the memory. Why all the security training? And safety. They kept harping on how dangerous the whole environment was, and all I could think was that quanta are infinitesimally small! How dangerous could they be? And besides, I'm sitting in a cube farm. They don't harp on about the organic chemicals outgassing from the fabrics. Those are probably more dangerous than the freezers in the basement.

And meetings. So many meetings. Morning standups with the squad, weekly reviews and planning meetings. Meetings with product and design. And then the meeting with Hodgson today. What a queer duck. I thought I was weird. I mean, I know I'm weird. Not just because people tell me I am. It's pretty obvious even to me. And I meet a lot of weird people. It comes with the sort of work I do, but Milt Hodgson was most likely the weirdest guy I'd ever met. MiltHodgson, Director CorpSec, 3 down from the Pres, Coordinates HQB2.0.3. Nobody I'd met had those coordinates. I didn't have a clue where that even was. And not easy to find, even with the app. And not easy to get to, unless you define easy as only having to show your ID to three separate stations and be confirmed each time that it was okay to proceed. 2nd sub-basement, somewhere under the entire complex. I couldn't begin to figure it out, and the app only showed the path, not the map. Weird. The whole thing was weird.

"MTS Anne Scolfield, HQ03.14.30...Ms. Scolfield." I presented my badge as was MEI's custom. Hodgson greeted me in a conference room that was probably steps away from his office. Or not. Who could know? I pulled back my badge and focused on his.

"Dir MiltHodgson HQB2.0.3...Mr. Hodgson." I took the seat across from him and waited. I was only a little nervous. What did I have to be nervous about? After three emails, one from Peter telling me to expect an invite from CorpSec for a security refresh, one from HR explaining the standard refresh meeting to expect from CorpSec, and one from CorpSec, telling me it was my mid-90 day security meeting refresh, I was pretty certain I was here for a standard security refresh meeting.

"Thank you for coming in." He looked down at a tablet and then back up. "How are things going so far? You settling in?"

This is where I'm supposed to say that everything is going great, that I was starting to feel my groove and that I was only mildly concerned about not getting up to speed as quickly as I would have liked. That's what the templates would have me say, but the reality was that at just about that time I thought I was going to have to quit. The work itself was overwhelming enough, but I hadn't signed up for all of the social interactions. I was there to write code, not be back in high school again.

But one thing I know for certain about me: when I'm struggling to answer those questions, nobody can tell that I'm struggling. I didn't understand what that meant until I played poker for the first time in college. A few of the aces at the table just looked at me funny every time I cleared the pile. My 'tell' is no affect at all. But that's the way I look most of the time, until you've been around me long enough.

All of which was flashing through my head as I prepared to answer Hodgson's questions. I looked up from my fingernails and smiled at him, the trigger for this particular template. "Thanks for asking! Yes, I'm starting to get the hang of things...I think." And then I realized that Hodgson could give a flying fuck about how I'm doing. He's CorpSec, not HR. Idiot. I get suckered almost every time by small talk.

"That's great. So, as all of the emails you've gotten suggest, this is just a routine mid-90 day security refresh meeting."

Phew! I had been worried for half-a-heartbeat. I didn't let my snark show; instead as he continued to recite what the emails had said, my mind wandered.

Late-January 32

"You're security cohort is Blue Zone. The work you'll be doing won't require you to get any additional security clearance, but you can always apply for Red Zone if you think it will help in some way."

I just nodded. I was only barely getting my bearings, a stupid pun I'd been hearing over and over again. I knew there were three security zones, Blue, Red and Checkered, and I knew there were three safety bands in each. I was in Blue2 -- I had access to anything without escort on the fifth, fourth and third floors, and of course the main floor. Nothing on the second (that was executive shit) and nothing in any of the basements. Mid-tier safety meant I had to be cautious handling my code, but nothing beyond the industry standards. Blue1 was general marketing and product documentation.

I shook my head. I couldn't imagine needing to go through more intense security screening; I'd read the general terms required and had heard from my new hire cohort who were placed in Red zones. It sounded like a total invasion of privacy -- interviewing partners, roommates, family members. And Checkered was even worse -- a total accounting of your past 15 years: travel, friends, Meetups, whatever. They said it was more stringent than some of the military clearances.

All of that left me curious, but not curious enough to want to go through it. Just made me wonder what the hell was really in those basement labs.

Mid-March 32 (Mid-90)

"Has your security clearance been sufficient to get your work done?"

I snapped back to Hodgson, my first impulse to shake my head. "I mean, no, I've not had any problems getting my work done because of my Blue2 zone."

"That's good. Part of the reason for this mid-90 security review is to make sure we're staying aligned with job function and security. There's three reasons for this meeting, actually..."

As stated in the emails. My mind wandered again. Okay, so there were 20 people in my new-hire cohort. I was in one of the least secure zone/bands. But I'm meeting with the Director of CorpSec?

"Do you have any questions?"

And as usual, my brain was late to the party; I didn't stop my mouth from asking. "Yeah, ummm, I'm wondering...why would I be meeting with you for this mid-90 security refresh meeting?" Easier to speak the lingo than make something up. Besides, it seemed to roll right off the tongue. "I mean, you probably have people for this, right?"

He laughed, his eyes glinting from the overhead lighting. "Good one! I don't get that very often. Well, there's a couple of reasons. One, we're pretty short-handed at the moment. And two, I've made it a policy that everyone in my department should be doing these. It keeps us refreshed and lets us meet some of the new associates."

I nodded and shook my head thinking refreshed...might mean something different...when he asked if I had any others.

He handed me a multiple choice quiz. "Pop-quiz time." He lowered his voice, which I understood to mean he was intending to be conspiratorial, another weirdness that confused me. "It really doesn't matter what you get right or wrong," he continued, "it's just to see how well our training materials are working."

I raised my eyebrows and looked down at the paper. 10 questions. Assume most of them had 'C' as the correct answer. Assume the longest answer was the right one. I scanned the sheet and saw only two were going to require actual thought. This is the time where I use the 'take your time template.' I read each question and reviewed each possible answer, confirming that my original assumptions were correct on seven of the eight. The eighth was a trick question, framed as a negative. I looked carefully at the final two and figured out what they were expecting me to answer. But the questions were ambiguous enough to let at least one other answer shimmy its way in.