Satyr Play

The doorway was suddenly filled with a broad-shouldered woman with intensely blue eyes. She had to be six-foot-four in her low-heeled black boots, surpassing her boss in height and width. Fair-skinned and blond, the head of Human Resources was a powerfully built woman who gave him the impression that she could probably take both of the men he'd met in the elevator lobby in a fight... at the same time.

"Ms. Gunderan, may I present the newest executive team member, Stanley Garin," the CEO said.

Stanley stood up to shake the hand of the tall blond. He saw her long hair was pulled back in an intricately woven braid, the bottom clasped with a shiny gold cylinder, which he spotted as it swung like a pendulum when she moved. She wore a business suit with a skirt, showing off her muscular but shapely legs.

"Welcome aboard, Mr. Garin," the woman said with a smile, and she gave the CEO a questioning glance. Villamor shook her head almost imperceptibly, but Stanley caught it and Gunderan's raised eyebrow response. He wasn't sure what that was about, but he was still dazed. The woman's voice was surprisingly feminine. He'd been expecting the much deeper octave from bodybuilding and possibly taking enhancers. On closer examination, though, there was nothing masculine about Gunderan. She was lovely, just big!

"Th-thank you," he stumbled, and she grinned at him.

"I'm not scaring you, am I?" she asked sweetly, ignoring the scowl from her boss.

"N-no, I get like this around puh-pretty women," he forced out, then froze, wide-eyed at what he'd just said. To the head of HR, nonetheless. AND the CEO! He closed his eyes and put his face in his hands.

"Oh, I like this one!" Gunderan chuckled happily.

"Sigrid," her boss scolded.

"Fine, but I can't help it if he's so cute," she chuckled at Villamor's growl. She turned to Stanley, who was looking at her once more. "This is a standard executive contract for our firm. Please read it before signing it. I can answer any questions you have as you go through it."

A group of men showed up in the doorway. Stanley looked over at them and immediately felt uneasy as they were all strikingly similar. They all were roughly the same height, had the same hair color, and generally had the same facial features. They could be twins... if that happened in groups of... eight?

"Ah, we're in the way, aren't we? Let's move to my office," the CEO said.

"Is this furniture going to storage?" Sigrid asked.

"Do you want it?" Villamor asked.

The tall blond moved to sit behind the desk and ran her hands over the surface. Then she gave it a heavy thump with her fist. The heavy desk took it in stride. She grinned. "Yes, please!" She looked over to the men in the doorway. "Please strip it back to the natural wood, then give it a light oiling and a sealant before delivering it to my office."

The closest man in the doorway nodded then the rest gave the nod. Again, the hairs on the back of Stanley's neck trembled.

Ms. Villamor stood and gestured for Stanley to follow her. Gunderan followed him. They walked down the hall into another waiting room. Sitting at a desk to the right of the inner door was a beautiful, dark-haired man who must have been the CEO's executive assistant. Beyond the inner door was a corner office. He sighed when he saw the view from the expansive windows. Her desk, situated at the apex of the two bands of windows, was exactly the kind of furniture he liked. A wide glass surface on a steel tubing frame. On closer examination, though, the glass surface blended different types and colors of glass. It looked something like a Kaleidoscope. Very pretty.

The CEO gestured for them to sit on the couch to read through the contract while she returned to her desk to get some work done.

It took Stanley some time to get through the document as he'd never read one before. There were a lot of clauses regarding confidentiality and some rather strict and ominous-sounding penalties for breaching them. Sigrid was very helpful in clarifying some of the legalese, and by the end, he felt comfortable signing the document. There was still the matter of filling out the fields for his compensation.

Ms. Villamor gestured for them to join her, so they stood and sat in the chairs before her desk. She leaned back in her chair, holding Stanley's eyes with hers. "I will start you off with an annual salary of $320,000, profit sharing, and full benefits. We will review your performance after six months and assess at that time if additional compensation is warranted. Is this acceptable?"

Stanley rarely laughed, but he couldn't stop from bursting into laughter now, thinking the woman was kidding. He looked around for the hidden cameras and saw only the two women watching him with puzzled expressions. When they didn't join in, his laughter quickly choked off. "I-I thought you were juh-joking, and this was all an elaborate puh-prank."

Ms. Villamor just held his eyes with hers.

"It is highly acceptable," he squeaked. Ms. Gunderan nodded and wrote in the figures. She slid the document over to him on the desk to sign. He took the pen and added his signature to the document.

"As a final authorization, we do require a tiny drop of blood in this box at the bottom of the form," the head of HR said, and he stared at her in surprise. She reached over and gently took his hand. She pricked his finger with a pin she suddenly had in her hand and gently squeezed the finger until a single droplet of blood fell toward the paper.

Before it touched, the droplet vaporized with a tiny puff.

The women went absolutely still and looked at Stanley closely. The young man in question was looking at the paper in puzzlement. He leaned forward to look closer as a second drop fell to the paper. It, too, disappeared with a slight hiss and pop.

"How is that happening?" he said slowly with wide eyes.

He missed the exchange between the executives. The head of HR was staring at the CEO intensely, and the brunette just gave her head one brief, sharp shake to shut down the unspoken question.

"We can dispense with that formality for now, Sigrid. Thank you. That will be all."

With a final glance at her boss, the tall blond gathered up the contract and left the office. Stanley put his finger in his mouth, but it had already stopped bleeding.

"Your predecessor, Mr. Hokensev, may have kept notes on the existing equipment. You should work with Paloma to review all of his documentation. I believe you'll find her highly motivated, and she'll prove indispensable."

He nodded to her.

"You can find your way back to your office, yes?" He nodded. She held out her hand, which he shook. "Welcome to VRL Investments," she said with a smile. "Now, go save us from disaster!"

Seeing he was being dismissed, he stood up. "Th-thank you for this op-op—chance!"

She smiled and made a shooing motion with her hand as she turned back to her work.

He walked to the door, and as his hand touched the handle, she called out to him.

"I've received reports that our Internet connection is remaining stable. That's an excellent start! Keep it up!"

He smiled back at her and nodded.

He walked back to his office and stopped in surprise when he saw there was already a silver plaque with his name printed on it on the wall next to the door. It also said CIO. He had to take a moment to absorb that.

When he stepped inside, he saw Ms. Gunderan speaking in hushed tones with Paloma, who smiled when she saw him.

"Welcome to VRL, Mr. Garin!" she said cheerfully. How she said the company name made it sound like she was saying virile.

He smiled at her and nodded to the head of HR, who returned the nod as she headed out.

Then Stanley was alone with the beautiful young woman with the bright smile.

"P-please call me Stanley."

"Oh! I couldn't do that, Mr. Garin! It's disrespectful," she exclaimed with wide eyes.

"Wuh-we're the same age!" he blurted, starting to feel a little dizzy in her presence.

"Please, I'm an Executive Assistant. You're a Chief Information Officer!" she gushed and leaned forward over her desk towards him.

Suddenly, Stanley's eyes were trapped in her deep... deep cleavage. He pulled his eyes away and saw she was looking at him expectantly. "Uh, what was I doing?"

"What would you like to do first?" she asked.

"Oh! Right, Ms. Villamor said you c-c-could get me all of Muh-Mr. Hokensev's documentation on the existing n-n-network inventory," he said. He gritted his teeth as he was becoming frustrated with his stuttering.

She nodded and walked out from behind her desk to enter his office. He followed and was stunned to see the blackout curtains were already gone. He had a pretty nice view, and the desk had been replaced with a modern glass and steel model. He noticed the lack of a computer on the desk but assumed they would let him pick his own. After all, he was in charge of that now.

He saw Paloma lean over one of the black filing cabinets against the wall and open a drawer. Was she intentionally wiggling her ass at him? No, it couldn't be. He pulled his mind back from where it was trying to go.

"Oh NO!" Paloma gasped.

"What is it?"

"His files! They've been destroyed!" she exclaimed.

He walked over to stand beside her and saw the drawer was full of ashes. "Someone burned them?"

Paloma had a stern look on her face. "It was probably Mr. Hokensev himself. He became rather... hostile in his last week with us."

Stanley was a little worried about what that might mean when he did his visual inspection and inventory of the network and systems equipment, which he would have to rely on without the documentation.

He turned to look into her lovely dark eyes as she pushed the drawer closed. "Can you get me an organization chart? I n-need to know the size of the c-c-company and how many wuh-workstations I can expect we'll be su-supporting." He looked away with a scowl.

He felt a hand on his arm and looked back in surprise.

"You don't have to be nervous around me. I'm here for you one hundred percent," she said gently, her compassion showing in her eyes.

He did feel himself calming a little and smiled at her gratefully.

She bit her plump lip and reluctantly pulled her hand back from his arm. "What do we do now?"

He cleared his throat and nodded, feeling his nerves settle down. Now, he was in his comfort zone. "We do an inventory manually. We start at the bottom and work our way up!" She smiled at his enthusiasm, and her eyes sparkled at his lack of stuttering. She gave him a firm nod.

He led the way back out to her desk, where she sent a quick request to HR to get a new org chart sent to them and to get her tablet.

"I'll keep notes of your findings," she said, and he smiled in return.

They returned to the basement, and Paloma showed him the code to manually access the server room until he had an access card. Once inside, they got to work.

It took them hours to record every piece of equipment in the room, but they made an excellent team. Paloma's enthusiasm never waned, and Stanley was in his element. He truly felt relaxed around this beauty, and that was a first. He kept his thoughts professional. While he longed for a girlfriend, he knew he'd be working closely with her and had to keep this relationship purely business.

Once they were done, he had a much firmer grasp of the scale of the company's network and the scope of just how much danger it was in. He began to have doubts about his ability to achieve his goal. He felt Paloma's hand on his arm once more.

"Don't let the size of this task intimidate you. I know you can do it! I can see you understanding everything you found in here, and that's amazing to me! You know what needs to be done! That's far ahead of what most people could achieve so quickly.

He felt his confidence returning.

"Can we do a quick inventory of the equipment in use on each floor on our way upstairs?" he asked, and she gave him a happy smile.

Paloma led him to the main floor. "Reception and Security are the only departments with terminals. It's my understanding that the two reception terminals have minimal access. Let me introduce you to Mr. Duncan, our head of security." She opened a locked door and led him down an access hallway to the security offices. He'd noted the cameras in the lobby and the camera in the hallway as well. When they reached the door to the security office, they had to buzz to be admitted.

Once inside, Stanley quickly made note of the terminals they had and the vast number of screens they had to review. Most seemed to be picking up feeds from external cameras, but a surprising amount were internal.

They had a small array of servers in the corner of the office, and he squatted down to take in their make and model.

"Ms. Villamor! What are you doing bringing a stranger into the Security Office!" growled a thick Scottish accent.

Stanley stood and turned to face the source of the voice and had to crane his neck back to see the eyes of the speaker. He was as tall and intimidating as the two men guarding the top-floor elevator lobby. Flaming red hair and a red beard dominated his features, but he had pale blue eyes and freckles over a nose that looked many times broken and reset poorly. He was wearing a black suit but looked like he'd be far more comfortable in combat gear.

"Mr. Duncan, this is Stanley Garin. VRL's new CIO."

Bushy red eyebrows rose, and his eyes hardened as he closely examined the small man standing before him.

"Aye, Ms. Gunderan sent me an update on a new employee. Your mum also sent me a note," the man said, not taking his eyes off him.

Stanley held out his hand. "Nice to meet you, sir."

The security chief gripped his hand hard, pumped it a few times, then released it with a smile. "It's nice to meet you as well. Are you going to fix the mess that bastard Hokensev left us in?"

"Uh, yes, sir. That's the plan. Your servers are going to be on the list of replacements. They're much too slow to keep up with the load you're putting them under. I'm only seeing regular cameras. Are you intending to add some with thermal imaging capabilities?" He got a nod and raised eyebrows from the man. "These servers won't do it," Stanley said, looking back at the machines in the corner. "The power backup is a joke, and that wall of monitors, they're old school, low-res CRTs, aren't they. Everything has to be replaced." His expression showed his frustration. How had these systems been left to rot for so long?

Mr. Duncan smiled at Paloma, who grinned back at him. "Mr. Garin, come with me. I'll get your security access set up."

They went to the man's office, and soon Stanley had his own access card to the building. The card gave him access everywhere, including the elevators up to the executive level, but it wouldn't open the other executive offices or the Security Office door.

Stanley looked at Paloma. "Am I going to find antiquated hardware on every floor?"

"Not in the Accounting Department," the Security Chief growled.

Paloma glanced at Stanley and nodded.

They moved on, going up floor-to-floor until they reached the second to last, where each workstation was relatively new, and each monitor was a wide aspect twenty-seven inch LCD flat panel. They'd reached the Accounting Department. Stanley looked around in surprise. This was the technology every floor should have been using.

They were approached by a slim, older man who had to be at least six-foot-two. Stanley wondered if there was an unspoken HR prerequisite for being tall he had somehow bypassed. He picked up Paloma's unease and looked a little closer at the approaching gentleman.

"Ah, Ms. Villamor, is this the new CIO I've been hearing about?" the tall man said with an odd hiss behind his words.

Paloma nodded and unconsciously moved slightly behind Stanley as she turned to address the CFO. "Mr. Pfister, may I introduce Stanley Garin."

The man eagerly held his long-fingered hand out to shake. Stanley noted he wore various rings on each finger, some quite ornate.

Just as the young man slid his hand into the larger grip, a static spark shot to Mr. Pfister's hand, striking three of the rings, causing the old man to yelp and yank his hand back.

"Wow! That was quite the static shock! Are you all right?" Stanley asked as the older man didn't look well at all. He was looking at Stanley in dread. Then he looked at his rings.

Seeing the older man was unsettled, Stanley saw an opportunity to go on the offensive. "I noticed that all the workstations on this floor are current, whereas all the lower floors are struggling with ancient equipment. Can you explain that?" he asked.

The man wasn't really paying attention to him as he fussed with his rings. "Their workstations are perfectly functional. There was no need to upgrade them."

Stanley looked at the man in surprise. "That decision falls under the purview of the CIO."

Mr. Pfister was beginning to look a little desperate to get the rings off, but they looked stuck. He was also beginning to look a little... green. "Yes, but the purchase orders are approved by me, so nothing is purchased without my say-so. So, I decide."

Paloma took Stanley's arm and quickly pulled him away as she saw he was starting to get angry.

She got him into the elevator, and they rode it up to the top floor. "We need to speak with your mother," Stanley grumbled to Paloma. She nodded, and they walked to the end of the hall. When they reached her outer office, her executive assistant, Felix, asked them to take a seat.

They must have been there for ten minutes when Mr. Duncan entered the waiting room and was directed to go straight in to see the CEO. Stanley's eyes were wide with shock as he took in the ripped state of the Security Officer's suit and a splash of what looked like blood on the man's arm and cheek. Paloma placed her hand on Stanley's arm to keep him seated, which calmed him down. Another ten minutes passed then Mr. Duncan emerged with a smile on his face. He nodded, winked at Stanley, and left.

"You may go in now," Felix said.

They rose and entered the office. Ms. Villamor gestured for them to take the seats across from her desk.

They sat, and Stanley immediately slid forward on his chair. When the woman turned her dark eyes on him, he felt it like a physical shock through his body. She was just so lovely!

"Muh-Ms. Villamor, I d-d-don't..." Paloma put her hand on Stanley's arm, and he felt himself calm. He kept his eyes on the surface of the CEO's desk. "I don't believe I'll be able to resolve this company's imminent technical crisis without an immediate adjustment in policy. The CIO must be the one who decides on what purchases are made for the company's IT requirements, not the CFO." He looked back gratefully at Paloma, and she smiled at him.

"I don't believe that will be an issue for us any longer. Mr. Pfister no longer works for VRL. I believe you'll find his replacement much more reasonable," the woman said with a wide smile.

"But- but I was just speaking with him—" he began in shock.

"And you left him in a very talkative mood. When Mr. Duncan spoke with him after you left, he confessed to embezzling from the company with Mr. Hokensev's assistance. This gave us grounds to... fire him for breach of contract. He was... escorted from the building. We won't be seeing him again."

Seeing the stunned look on Stanley's face, she glanced at the clock and smiled. "You've had a very busy first day. It's well past eight, so why don't you head home, and we'll see you bright and early tomorrow morning."

"Uh, thank you, Ms. Villamor. Good night," Stanley said as he got to his feet. He admitted to himself he was tired. He was eager to move forward with this project but also needed to rest. He also had a long commute ahead of him.