This short story gave me some anxiety, not from writing it but from “losing” it. I’ld brought it to work so that I could do a little editing during my lunch break, and when I went home I realized I’ld forgotten it at my desk. Usually this wouldn’t be a problem, but it was Friday and I’m not driving back to work over the weekend just to pick up a short story. This of course set off my anxiety in the most ridiculous way: what if someone broke in and stole my notepad? What if the office burned down? Whit if – horror of horrors – one of my co-workers read it and realized I wrote dorky slice of life sci fi short stories?
Of course none of this happened and here I come, presenting a short story that caused more anxiety than it warrants:
Digging deep:
“Flack, the’ve got BIX in here.”
Carol turned away from the filing cabinet she was sorting through at Frank’s incredulous laugh. A quick glance at what he was holding shows there was, in fact, a BIX polarized recording deck. Dropping the handful of 10 cycles old catering invoices she had been sorting through Carol came over, dusting her hands off on her work jumper. It didn’t do much – this far into the back rooms the ink dust from the vats in the main processing floor coated everything in a thin layer of dark dust.
“Can you believe this?” Frank showed her another BIX deck, labeled Carnia Bollest fire Y. 3206 then gestured to the numerous other BIX decks scattered amongst old, dingy binders and faded booklets. “I haven’t see a BIX display in twenty years, let alone a deck. Thought these were all junked years ago.”
“looks like training videos,” Carol flipped through multiple labels – Blast Doors and You, Crane Maintenance, Filing Form 32X-599. “I didn’t even realize these cabinets were back here, they must have dumped them in here and forgot about it.” They closed the cabinet with the BIX decks and opened the next cabinet down. It opened after some tugging in a puff of dark dust to show more junk.
“What even is this?” Frank held up an odd, boxy machine, finger prints leaving bright grey spots through the dust as he turned it over in his hand. The black dome and single input slot gave no clue to its function.
Carol peered into the rest of the cabinet. “It looks like the rest of the junk are parts of an old phone system, so it might be some sort of hub or connecting line.”
“Doesn’t look like any phone system I’ve seen, and I don’t think this end would-”
“What are you two doing?”
They turned to see James Bolvert, corporate’s recently appointed warehouse overseer, behind them with a Mobile Scanner Bot trailing behind him.
“Archaeology.” Frank held up his find, expression mock serious.
“We’re here looking for the old clatterback invoices not playing and,” Bolvert grimaced as the MSB trundled past him, disturbing the dust. “The sooner we’re done the better. We should have someone go back here and deep clean this place.” He scowled as he tried to brush the dust off his suit, muttering under his breath “I should have brought breathing filters. If this puts me in a health pod, I’m billing.”
Frank rolls his eyes, then mouths “corporate” with a sad shake of his head while Bolvert isn’t looking. When Frank goes to open his mouth Carol kicks him in the ankle with a glare. She’s not getting written up because Frank can’t keep his smart comments to himself.
“I’m sure we’ll find what you’re looking for soon, sir.” They will not. There are dozens of cabinets back here, some stacked over their heads, and there seemed to be no rhyme or reason on what had been placed where. There weren’t even labels on most of them, and none of the labels were helpful. Some were simply vague (such as folders) while others were completely unhelpful. One label had just been a series of question marks, as if the labeler hadn’t been certain what they were dealing with. “Why don’t you head back to the office to finish unpacking while we sort through the old folders?”
Bolvert glanced around, sniffing as if he had smelled something unpleasant. “Very well, I expect to hear back from you in an hour.”
“Of course,” Frank nodded earnestly with an expression Carol already knew meant there would be no call from him.
Bolvert left, one hand over his mouth and nose as if that would do him any good. With him gone the two of them turned back to the file cabinets, the MSB starting to scan it’s way through stacks of old synth-printed invoices behind them.
“Well,” Frank clapped his hands together and rubbed them eagerly. “Shall we begin?”
