6.o.
“It’s done,”
said Commander Credit.
Attached to
the greed-gun was a small metallic dish comprised of several, individual,
flower petal-like segments. This was
housed in a pivoting gear box and the whole assembly rotated and tilted and spun
around. There were tiny lights, half the
size of push tacks, arranged in a strip around the base. One the lights blinked green.
“We can get a
sense of direction out of those… things inside the gun,” said Commander
Credit. He turned slowly until the second
bulb in the series flickered. The first
bulb continued to glow but ceased blinking.
“This way,”
said Commander Credit. And they moved
down the hall.
“There should
be sound,” said Business Woman.
“What?” asked
Commander Credit.
“Yeah, right,”
Franklin Buck said. “Like a deet, deet
noise that gets quicker as you get closer.”
“That’s what
the lights are for,” said Commander Credit.
“But you have
to look at the lights,” said Business Woman.
“And the
deet-deet-deet-deet would be exciting,” Franklin Buck added.
“Yeah. You know what else would be exciting?”
Commander Credit said.
“How do we
know it’s sensing the correct greed source?” asked Corporate
Man. Man.
“There’s only
gonna be one source here,” said Fair Wage.
“Everyone is scrambling to keep their jobs. They barely have time to fantasize about
wealth much less be greedy.”
The Union
continued to walk down the corridor, everyone eyeing the small lights on the
greed-gun assembly. Those, who could not
see, politely jockeyed for a position in which they could. All the clustering about irritated Commander
Credit and he wished he would have installed some sort of audio alert on the
device.
The next light
blinked yellow.
They
instinctively quickened their pace. When
they reached a T-junction at the end of the hallway they turned right, but the
yellow light switched off. So they went
back and took the left passage, but saw the same result.
“Well, what
now?” asked Franklin Buck.
“We go
straight,” said Corporate Man.
“Gentlemen,”
said Senior Executive. “Don’t mind
us. We’re working on another project.”
The workers
seemed to ease at this, comforted by the notion that these strangers were already
employed and would, therefore, not be stealing hard one cubicle wall assembling
positions. Senior Executive continued to
chat with the workers while Commander Credit replaced the paneling and then
consulted the greed-gun. When they moved
out, Senior Executive handed the maintenance workers a few business cards and
told them to keep up the good work.
This sequence
of events repeated itself.
It was never
the same location of panel wall that was removed and never the same set of
workers they found on the other side.
The greed-gun
charged through its yellow sequence and was now a fiery red.
The Union
stopped in front of a seemingly insignificant panel of cubicle wall, pausing
with breath held instinctively for dramatic effect.
