Brian’s Torment Score crept from 143 to a measly 144.
“For feck’s sake,” he muttered. “How’s a demon supposed to meet our targets with the codes they’re giving us?”
He shook his head at his screen, which showed a woman in Garfield pyjamas lying sprawled across a bed with the duvet kicked off. His own face was faintly reflected in the monitor’s glass, too. The entire team had been flayed several decades back, and so he was all exposed muscle and bone—not to mention the eyeballs. He was told those really popped.
“We’ll give it another go, sure,” he said, running the code again.
Garfield pyjamas woke with a start, grumbled something, and rolled onto her side. In the bottom right-hand corner of the screen, Brian’s Torment Score rose to 145.
“I don’t know, lads…” he said, burying his face in his hands. “I just don’t know…”
Ennis perched themselves on the side of his desk. They wore an ill-fitting navy pin-striped suit, paired with a dusty purple fedora that looked like it had been sat on several times. Beneath the decrepit hat, a small patch of curly hair clung to a scrap of scalp at the nape of their neck and trailed halfway down their back. “Having the time of your death, I see,” they said, peering down at Brian’s screen.
“I’m telling you, it’s the codes!” he complained. “This job would be grand if we just had better codes…”
Brian meant ‘grand’ in the Irish sense of the word, which is to say tolerable. Ennis knew that—the pair were from different continents and time periods, but they’d been working together long enough. Almost a century, in fact.
“Grand, eh?” Ennis asked. They couldn’t exactly smile anymore, but they quirked what was left of their lip.
“You know what I mean,” Brian grumbled. “We’re bottom of the board again. Strife will be raging!”
He glanced over at their manager’s office. It was a small, poorly lit room adjoining theirs, separated only by a thick glass wall. The design gave the impression the floor was under constant surveillance, but Strife was invariably glued to her computer screen. She was obsessed with shoes. Dozens upon dozens of pairs were stacked in boxes against the back wall of her office, making the cramped space even smaller. But it was never enough. A new pair would keep her occupied for all of five minutes before she went back to her computer and started scrolling for the next. At least it kept her off of their backs.
Well, for the most part… She’d notice their Torment Scores eventually.
Ennis pulled a rotten apple from their pocket and started tossing it from one hand to the other. “She can rage all she likes.”
Brian raised his eyebrow muscles. “Can she, now? You do know what they do to ‘bottom quality agents?’”
“Those are just rumours,” Ennis said, and bit into the apple’s spongey, brown flesh.
“Carmen never came back!” Brian exclaimed.
“Exactly,” Ennis mumble-chewed. “She could have been sent anywhere.”
“She was sent upstairs!” Brian insisted.
Ennis just shrugged and took another bite of apple.
Brian cursed and ran his code again, but Garfield was wide awake now and so his Torment Score didn’t budge. “Satan’s scrotum…”
“Wait, are you using POKE?” Ennis barked a laugh. “Damn, you’re sunk, ’mano. That code is useless.”
“Tell me about it!” Brian spammed the code repeatedly, to no avail. “What did you get?”
“BURNED TOAST.”
“Sure that’s almost as bad…”
Ennis casually tossed the rotten apple core into a bin halfway across the room. “You know how it is. They’re not about to waste good codes on entry-level associates like us.”
Brian sighed. “We’re so feck—”
“INCOMING!” some demon shouted, making him jump.
It was Gertie. It was always Gertie. Brian rarely spoke to her directly, and yet he knew so very much about her—from her favourite colour (puce), to her favourite method of torturing humans (chafing underwear). He even knew the painstaking details of the thimble collection she’d amassed before she died and went to hell… All because she was seemingly incapable of speaking quieter than a vacuum cleaner.
Strife had heard her too, of course. She was the only one of them with her skin intact, and yet she remained most terrifying. She gave Gertie a look that would make even a stone gargoyle tremble, before tearing the incoming fax from the yellowed, aging machine in the corner of her office.
“I bet it’s the monthly report!” Sarah exclaimed excitedly from the desk behind Brian’s.
“Some demon sounds confident…” he said, swivelling around to face her.
She’d been making little gremlins out of Play-Doh. Some of the stuff had stuck to the exposed muscles and tendons of her fingers, making them a blotchy, multi-coloured mess. “My last code was FLAT TYRE. It. Was. Amazing!” she said, idly twirling a braid of telephone cords she’d stapled to her skull. “I think this could be my month, you know.”
“Fair play to you!” Brian said, hoping his words didn’t sound too forced. It wasn’t that he disliked Sarah, (although, to be clear, he absolutely did); it was just that the better she performed, the worse he looked, and that made him nervous. Much as the job had its downsides, it was still the best he’d ever had. Which wasn’t saying much. He’d died young, so his CV was short: Torment Service Associate, and errand boy.
His final days on earth had been spent trying not to look bored as his mistress shopped for hours in 19th century Dublin, hurrying after her with stacks of whatever she’d bought—stacks that were sometimes so high they obscured his vision.
That, incidentally, was how he’d died. They say he walked right out in front of a carriage! There was more to it, of course. More, meaning gremlins.
“This time I got PRICE HIKE,” Sarah explained. “It’s not quite as good as FLAT TYRE, but I had the great idea of teaming up with Horace here!” She patted the demon sitting next to her on the arm, and he gave a little nod, making the yellow-brown fat tissue hanging from his chin bulge momentarily.
Brian had never spoken much to Horace—mostly on account of the demon’s breath, which was rancid as a chum bucket, but also on account of, well, just Horace. He tended to stare blankly at you, his mouth hanging open as he wheeze-breathed. And he had the most ridiculous way of speaking…
“Upon this occasion, the code which summons FLIES has been granted to me,” Horace said, his foul breath wafting in all directions.
Ennis grimaced. “Don’t suppose you’d like to swap with Brian here?”
“Please,” Sarah said before Horace could answer. “We’re onto a good thing here. Horace sends his flies in, and I flood the human’s ad feed with discounted UV zappers. Then, the second they go to actually buy one…”
“PRICE HIKE,” Horace bellowed, and the stench of rotting fish suddenly intensified, making both Brian and Ennis groan.
“There is admittedly a little down-time involved,” Sarah continued, seemingly oblivious—Brian wondered, not for the first time, if her olfactory receptors might have been ripped out when they’d flayed her.
“I’ve been using it to make these little guys!” Sarah said as she softened a new piece of Play-Doh with one hand and gestured at the figures littering her desk with the other. “Aren’t they just adorable?”
Ennis picked one up, studying it closely. “This one has an erection…”
“They all have erections!” Sarah exclaimed, pulling the muscles of her mouth into something that vaguely resembled a smile.
Ennis gingerly placed the figure back down and wiped their hands on their trousers. “Vamo’, let’s get down to it,” they said, leaning forward and speaking with utterly uncharacteristic gravitas. “Brian is bottom of the board. He’s worried Strife might send him upstairs...”
Sarah’s neck muscles visibly tightened. “Oh…”
“Yeah, bad business. But maybe Horace here could lend him that FLIES code for a spell, eh? Help a guy out.”
Sarah stiffened. “Well, maybe for a little while, but—”
“That’s the ticket!” Ennis beamed before tucking into yet another rotten apple.
Brian was about to ask where they were getting the things when Strife stormed out of her office in a pair of neon pink stripper heels.
“Torment Service Associates! The monthly report is…” She trailed off, eyes settling on Ennis. “Why aren’t you at your desk? Why aren’t you ever at your desk?”
Ennis just shrugged.
Strife shook her head in annoyance and continued where she’d left off. “The monthly report is in. Gremlins!”
Sarah squealed in delight as several of the small, winged creatures flew in from the hallway. They ranged in colour from green to red to orange and yellow, with little horns and oversized jet-black eyes. They were completely naked, but to Brian’s relief, none of them appeared to have an erection—at least, not yet.
“Bring us up to date,” Strife said, handing the fax to the closest gremlin. It blinked at her, hiccupped, and then flew headfirst into the Torment Scoreboard. The other gremlins laughed hysterically as it fell to the ground, wings twitching.
Strife removed one of her stripper heels and threw it at them. “Get on with it!”
The gremlins parroted her in mocking, high-pitched tones, but got to work swapping out names and numbers all the same.
Strife took a deep breath and straightened her suit jacket before turning back to the floor. “Some say the work we do here is pointless… That I’m a laughing stock. That you’re laughing stocks… That we make a mockery of Torment Services itself.”
“They do?” Gertie asked, sounding crestfallen.
Strife ignored her. “I mean, in these times of rising political tensions, economic instability, food insecurity etcetera, etcetera, here you are burning toast! Pathetic, right?” she asked, looking pointedly at Ennis. “But sometimes, it’s the little things that matter most! Those micro-annoyances that push people over the edge, straight into Satan’s open arms. And that’s where the Torment Service Associate comes in, making the world a shittier place, one small—Sarah, put that gremlin down!”
“I just want to give him some belly rubs!” Sarah huffed as a little green gremlin desperately tried to squirm from her grip.
Strife pinched the bridge of her nose. “You know what? I had a whole thing planned, but forget it. We’ll just skip to the bit where our top TSA is revealed… It’s Raymond,” she announced with zero fanfare. “Congratulations Raymond.”
Several demons clapped half-heartedly as Strife produced a paper party hat. “Gremlins!” she cried again, and one dutifully drifted over to take the hat from her. It placed the thing atop Raymond’s head, pulling the elastic taut so that it snapped around the exposed muscles of his neck. Raymond winced and angrily shooed the creature away.
“Raymond again?” Sarah complained, when the green gremlin she’d been clutching bit down on her fingers. “What the shit!” she cried, releasing it.
Strife sighed. “Yes, Sarah, Raymond again. And he’s not even that good! Honestly, there are demons downstairs who get better numbers in a single day than this entire team gets in a year. Torment Services’ Employee of the month, for instance. Gremlins! Update the picture!”
An orange gremlin belched loudly before overlaying the previous employee of the month portrait with the new one. It was a black and white, low resolution pixelated print-out on vermilion and white fax paper with perforated edges, and it depicted… some sort of blob, just like last time, and the time before, and the time before that.
“And now Bob the blob again… No fair!” Sarah cried and pounded her desk, squashing two-and-a-half of her Play-Doh figures. “They’ve won it, like, six hundred times in a row!”
“Six hundred and twenty-three,” Brian said, correcting her.
“Oh my devils, you’re such a fanboy,” Sarah sneered.
“Fandemon. And what of it? Bob the Blob is a legend!”
“Their name is not Bob the Blob!” Strife barked. “Their name is Gormandizer, Archduke of the Fetid Wastes!”
“Archduke?” Horace asked, “I thought they were a God…”
“Might as well be, with the codes they’ve got…” Ennis said, covering their nose as Horace’s revolting fish breath wafted in their direction. “Plagues, famines, earthquakes… How’re we supposed to compete with that?”
Strife crossed her arms. “You’re not, Ennis. You’ve been given a target more commensurate with your skill level, which is to say so low it’s almost on the floor. Incompetence will not be tolerated!” Strife raised her voice and cast her eyes about the room. “Bottom quality agents will be subject to review!”
Brian groaned at that. It’s not like Strife could kill him or anything—he was already dead. She could torture him some more, but most of his pain receptors had been torn out when they’d skinned him… She’d send him upstairs, he was sure of it.
“INCOMING!” Gertie shouted as the fax machine screeched to life.
“What now…” Strife said, teetering back into her office on one heel. “Gremlins!” she cried, clicking her fingers impatiently. “My stiletto!”
One of the gremlins dutifully carried it into her office, hovered about with it for a moment… then dropped it right on her head. Strife cursed and tried to grab the creature out of the air, but it tumbled out of reach and flew off giggling.
Several TSAs snickered.
“Get back to work, all of you!” Strife cried, slamming the door to her office so hard the glass shook.
A hushed silence fell over the floor.
“Such a drama queen,” Ennis said eventually, and bit into another rotten apple.
“Where in the name of Lucifer are you getting those?” Brian asked, turning his attention back to his computer. Garfield had finally fallen back asleep.
“The break room,” Ennis said, making no move to go back to their own desk.
Brian cracked his knuckles and ran the POKE code again, but nothing happened—Garfield was out for the count. “Son of a dirty…” He trailed off, brow muscles contracting. “Wait, there’s a break room?”
Ennis gave him a flat stare. “You’ve been working here over a century, Brian...”
“But it’s not like I’ve gone wandering the halls… I’ve been too busy, what with the board and my Torment Score and all that. Besides, we don’t even get breaks. Why would there be a break room when we don’t get breaks?”
“Maybe some of the other teams get them,” Ennis shrugged. “Either that, or it’s for managers…” They took another bite of apple. This one had a maggot wriggling inside. “Want to take a look?” they asked, forehead muscles shooting up.
“Feck no!” Brian cried before dropping his voice to a whisper, suddenly self-conscious. “We’re bottom of the board, remember?”
Again, Ennis just shrugged.
Brian had no idea how they could be so laid back. He glanced over at Strife, who now appeared to be arguing with some demon on the phone. “She looks pissed,” he said, chewing on one of his nails—a habit he’d failed to shake even in death. “We seriously need to get our numbers up…” he muttered, moving to another nail. “Wait, I’ve an idea… We can team up!”
“And what? Poke people as their toast burns?” Ennis threw their head back and laughed.
“It worked for Sarah and Horace…” Brian muttered, cheek muscles reddening with little droplets of blood.
“’Chacho, just use Horace’s code!”
Brian grunted. While it was true that agents weren’t supposed to swap codes under any circumstances (and that those caught doing so ran the risk of being tortured at the very least), Strife was unlikely to notice the transgression—the moment she got off of the phone she’d probably go back to shoe shopping. And spamming Horace’s FLIES code for even a few minutes was bound to get Brian’s Torment Score up—his human couldn’t sleep through a swarm.
“You know what? Feck it, I will,” Brian said. “You can have it for a bit as well, sure.”
Ennis shook their head. “I’m good, thanks.”
“Ennis, you’ve never been good. You’ve been middling, at best, and lately your scores have taken a turn for the worse.”
“Doesn’t matter,” Ennis replied cooly.
“Doesn’t…” Brian could barely contain himself. “They’ll send you upstairs!
Ennis waved a finger. “Not me, I’m getting sent downstairs.”
Brian just stared at them. “Downstairs? Downstairs as in where they send the good agents?”
“Right,” Ennis said, finishing off the second rotten apple.
“How do you figure that?”
Ennis tossed the core away and took a crumpled leaflet from their pocket, which they dropped onto Brian’s desk. Once he’d ironed the creases out a little, Brian saw it pictured three goofy-looking Torment Service Associates—ones that hadn’t yet had the pleasure of being skinned.
Brian’s forehead muscles contracted in a frown. “Where did you get this?”
“The break room… There’s a notice board in there.”
The leaflet had ‘DESCENT PROGRAMME’ printed across the top in bold letters and some smaller text along the bottom, reading:
Tired of working hard, or even at all?
Then aim for the pits with our all-new leadership training!
Meet like-minded slackers, pretend to learn new skills and level down your CV today—
“Ennis!” some demon roared, startling Brian.
It was Strife. She was standing in the doorway of her office, hands on hips, mouth puckered like she was sucking on a lemon. “Get in here!”
Brian quickly pulled the flyer under the table as Ennis stretched their arms overhead, leaning left and then right so their spine let out a series of little pops.
“Now!” Strife snapped.
Ennis sauntered over. The moment Strife shut the glass door behind them, the office erupted into gossip.
“This is bad,” Sarah said, leaning so far forward across her desk that several Play-Doh gremlins got squashed beneath her. “Ennis was bottom of the board six months in a row; they’re getting sent upstairs for sure. And you know what that means!”
Brian didn’t answer. He was too busy trying to lip-read. Given that Ennis didn’t have much left of their lips, that was a tall order.
“You’ll be next!” Sarah hissed in his ear.
“Mm-hmm,” Brian said, craning his neck to get a better view of Ennis. He couldn’t let them get sent upstairs. He’d heard all kinds of rumours about the fiends they had working up there. They weren’t even demons, they were—
“Wait,” he said suddenly. “Ennis was never bottom of the board! They were often a close second, sure, but up until the two of you teamed up, Horace was always bottom!”
Sarah rolled her eyeballs. “It was only ever Horace because Ennis kept swapping their names on the board.”
Brian wanted to argue, but that honestly made a lot of sense. He wasn’t sure he’d ever actually seen Ennis working.
“I am content to swap names,” Horace said, breath as putrid as ever. It was enough to make Brian’s eyes water, and without eyelids to blink, his vision blurred. He hadn’t a hope of lip-reading now.
“Don’t worry,” Sarah said, leaning even further forward to pat Brian on the arm. “Ennis is fucked, obviously, but like I said, you can borrow Horace’s code until you get your score up. You know, for a price,” she added in that irritatingly chirpy voice of hers.
“A price?” Brian asked.
“I want new cords for my hair,” Sarah said, flicking her ‘braid.’ “Coloured ones.”
“Where am I supposed to get coloured phone cords?”
Before Sarah could answer, Ennis burst from Strife’s office shouting: “So long, tontos! I’m out of this joint.”
Brian jumped to his feet and opened his mouth to speak, but Ennis wasn’t done.
“I’d say it’s been a pleasure, but we all know that’s crap!” Ennis picked up their computer without unplugging it, precariously balancing three rotten apples and a very dead-looking cactus on top. “Strife, you were a lousy manager, and your shoes, diablo mio!”
Strife gave an indignant little harumph as Ennis walked past her towards the exit. “Horace, your breath smells like something crawled inside your mouth and died. Sarah, your Play-Doh gremlins are downright weird. Brian—” The computer’s power cable pulled taught, so Ennis gave it a good yank. The screen went black and the rotten apples toppled to the floor, rolling off in different directions.
Ennis sighed. “Well, like I said... so long!”
And they left.
Just like that.
“Good riddance,” Strife muttered, before turning her attention back to the floor. “Gremlins! Scoreboard!” she screeched, and the creatures got to work removing Ennis’ name.
“Congratulations to Brian—our new bottomest quality TSA,” Strife said. “Gertie you’re not too far off. So, get back to work. That goes for all of you!”
Suddenly every demon was typing furiously. Every demon but Brian, that is.
“Well don’t just stand there!” Strife snapped. “Back. To. Work!”
Brian clearly hadn’t heard a single word she’d said, so Sarah pulled him down into his seat by his jacket.
Strife just shook her head and went back to shoe shopping.
“The coast is clear,” Sarah whispered. “Go get the cords, and I’ll lend you Horace’s FLIES code!”
“Cords?” Brian asked.
“Yes! You’ll find some in the supply closet.”
“The supply closet…” he echoed absently.
“Yeah, you know, by the elevator,” Sarah said, rolling one of her crushed Play-Doh gremlins into a green-flecked orange ball. “I’d go myself, but, you know, ghosts.”
“Right…” Brian said, mind still miles away.
He’d assumed he and Ennis would be working together forever—they’d signed up for death, after all. Every demon here had…
Some Play-Doh bounced off of the back of his head.
“What the fe—”
“Stop screwing around!” Sarah said, raising her arm threateningly. “Do you want the code or not?”
“I…” Brian shielded his face with his hands as Sarah threw more Play-Doh at him.
“Get. The. Cords!” she yelled.
Several gremlins fluttered over and started repeating her words over and over in a cacophony of high-pitched, dissonant voices:
“Get the cords! Get the cords! Get the cords! Get the cords!”
Brian cursed, jumping to his feet. “Alright, alright! Satan’s scrotum…”
The office supply closet was pretty barren aside from several piles of envelopes bearing the Torment Services pitchfork logo. There were a couple of boxes of ballpoint pens—both almost empty, several dozen packets of staples, but no staplers to go with them, and in the very back: thumbtacks, rubber bands, a ball of twine, and even some coloured Post-Its, but alas, no phone cords.
“Well, that was a waste of time,” Brian muttered as he peered down the corridor. There were dozens of doors, probably leading to offices just like his, but he didn’t see any more supply closets. He supposed he could try another floor… the elevator was right there, after all.
Its double steel doors had been painted a deep crimson red, matching the thick wool carpeting, and essentially everything in the building—Torment Services hadn’t exactly been creative with its colour scheme. Brian glanced up at the indicator arrows above the elevator, wondering if Ennis had gone downstairs like they’d said they would, or up as he feared. He suddenly remembered the flyer, and pulled it from his pocket, hoping to find out where this ‘DESCENT PROGRAMME,’ or whatever, was held:
Sign-up forms available from Demon Resources, Room #132, Floor—
A shrivelled, rotten apple core was stuck to the paper, rendering the rest of the text illegible.
“So help me, Ennis…” Brian muttered, recrumpling the flyer.
It was probably for the best. The FLIES code was fairly decent, but it wouldn’t save his sorry, skinless backside if he wasted any more time. He stuffed a few things from the supply closet into his pockets and starting making his way back to the office, but his thoughts kept going back to Ennis. Before he knew it, he was standing at an intersection, hopelessly lost. Each corridor looked exactly the same—an endless stretch of glossy wood-laminate doors with little Bakelite nameplates. Not recognising any of the office numbers, he took a corridor at random, and then another, scanning the nameplates until eventually one caught his eye. It read: Break Room.
“Ha!” Brian said, cautiously stepping inside.
The room was small, with wall cabinets and a sink to the right, and a chequered, tweed couch to the left. A large portrait of Satan hung on the far wall, dominating the space. He was portrayed in his classic ‘red devil’ form, pitchfork and all, but he wore a suit rather than the loincloth humans typically depicted him in. He was also giving a big, cheesy smile, just like the TSAs pictured on the front of Ennis’ flyer.
“That reminds me…” Brian said, remembering the noticeboard they’d mentioned.
“Reminds you of what?” some demon asked.
Brian spun around to find a ghoul eating a moldy donut. The walking corpse of a creature wore a nametag that read:
Employee #27,250,917,357
Designation: Eugene
Position: Junior Filing Clerk.
“Satan save us, not a filing clerk…” Brian thought to himself, trying not to stare into Eugene’s exposed nasal cavities.
“Em…” It was impossible not to look, they were right there. “I… em…”
Eugene just kept chomping away. His eyes were completely black, like two more holes…
“I… was looking for the notice board,” Brian managed finally, and started biting a thumbnail.
“You mean this one, right here?” the ghoul asked, pointing to the huge corkboard right beside him. It was covered in overlapping memos, flyers and posters, the largest of which read: ‘Apples are for administrative staff only!!’ The sentence was underlined three times.
Brian gave an embarrassed laugh. “Well how about th—AAAAAhhhh!!!”
A ghost materialized through the wall and into the couch, so that only her upper body was visible. She hovered there a moment, wiping a pair of horn-rimmed glasses on her blouse. Once satisfied they were smudge-free, she slid them back in place, taking care not to disturb her spiralling beehive.
“What are you screaming about?” she asked, gliding over.
“I… em…” Brian stammered. He hadn’t seen a ghost since induction—they’d worked surveillance, spying on new hires to ensure compliance. Sure enough, this one’s badge read:
Employee #56,496,395,772
Designation: Janice
Position: Petty Security Officer.
“Em…” Brian said again, then went back to biting his thumbnail.
“Yeah, he does that,” Eugene said, leaning towards Janice and lowering his voice to a whisper. “Look at his badge—he’s a TSA. They’re all a little… you know.” Eugene twirled a finger by his head.
Janice’s eyes flicked down to Brian’s badge and she suddenly grew taller, towering over both him and the ghoul. Her mouth stretched impossibly wide and she started to glow so bright Brian had to cover his eyes.
“THIS BREAK ROOM IS FOR ADMINISTRATIVE AND SECURITY STAFF ONLY!!” she howled. “I WILL BE REPORTING THIS TO YOUR LINE MANAGER IM—”
Brian fled the break room.
#
“What the fuck is this?” Sarah asked when he dumped some Post-Its and a ball of twine on her desk.
“There wasn’t any phone cord in the supply closet,” Brian explained, dropping into his seat.
Sarah gave a short laugh and crossed her arms. “Well, I guess it was a wasted journey then! I’m not lending Horace’s code for this crap.”
“Ah, don’t be like that,” Brian pleaded. “The Post-Its are coloured… Close enough, right? You can make… an origami garland or something.”
Sarah raised a brow muscle. “An origami garland?”
“Sure!” Brian said, pulling a length of twine. “You know, like… em… like this…” He tried to make a crane, but quickly gave up and just crumpled some Post-Its around the string instead. “See?” he asked, tying his creation to the phone cords already dangling from Sarah’s skull. “Sure aren’t you just gorgeous!”
Sarah ran a hand through her new ‘hair,’ and several of the Post-Its immediately fell to the ground.
“Look, I tried,” Brian said, shoulders slumping. “Can I please just have the code?”
Sarah clicked her tongue in annoyance. “Fine, you can have the stupid code, but just until you claw yourself out of the bottom spot on the board—Horace and I have work to do.”
#
“Oh my devils, how are you still in last place?” Sarah asked some time later. “Your Torment Score’s barely moved!”
“I know,” Brian groaned. “I’m trying, it’s just…”
Just that he missed Ennis.
“…It’s just that this human of mine is well pissed. I’m sending in swarms of flies, but he’s too plastered to take any notice!”
“Wow. You are so fucked,” Sarah said matter-of-factly. “May as well give Horace his—”
“DELIVERY!” Gertie cried, cutting her off.
Strife rushed out of her office, clapping her hands together excitedly. “That’ll be my new platfor—” The words died on her lips as she took in the figure standing in the doorway. Or hovering in the doorway, rather.
It was a ghost.
Brian’s chest tightened. For a second, he thought that beehived apparition from the break room had tracked him down, but this ghost was a young man, with hollowed out cheeks and eyes like big grey orbs.
“You’re not a mail clerk…” Strife said, looking him up and down. “You’re not even a ghoul! Gertie, why the heaven did you shout ‘DELIVERY’?”
“Sorry!” Gertie said, wringing her hands. “I saw him there and just assumed…”
“Oh, for hell’s sake!” Strife muttered. “What do you want, then?” she demanded of the ghost. “Some of us have work to do!”
“Um…” he said, clearly taken aback. “I’m Ned… your new TSA.”
The room went deathly quiet save for a gremlin hiccupping in the corner.
Ned forced a smile and waved half-heartedly at them all. When no demon waved back, he gave a nervous little laugh. “Demon Resources said they’d send something called a ‘fax’ to let you know I was on my way?”
“INCOMING!” Gertie cried as the machine in Strife’s office started up.
Strife set her jaw and crossed her arms, but before she could say anything, Sarah piped up.
“The fuck is he a TSA! He’s not even a demon, he’s a g—” Sarah made a gagging sound. “A g—” She gulped and tried again. “A g-ghost!”
Brian had never seen her so worked up. She must have felt the same way about ghosts that he felt about gremlins.
“So, funny story…” Ned said. “I was earmarked to be a demon, but I didn’t make it through the transformation, so… I got turned into a ghost instead.”
“Transformation?” Brian asked, as the entire floor burst into uproar. He didn’t remember any transformation… just dying, but not being dead dead. What bit of him had been ‘transformed?’
“QUIET!” Strife snapped, before turning back to Ned, eyes narrowed. “This is most irregular,” she said, drumming her fingers. “In all my years, I’ve never seen a ghost work anything other than security.”
Ned shrugged. “They said you needed to backfill some demon.”
“Fuck. That.” Sarah exclaimed.
“I said quiet!” Strife screeched, making Ned flinch, his form flickering momentarily in and out. Strife took a breath, somewhat recomposing herself. “Well don’t just float there, take a seat!”
Ned shot out into the middle of the floor, phasing through desks and demons alike as she stomped into her office, tore the fax from the machine, and started poring over it.
“This is absolute gargoyle dick,” Sarah whispered. “A ghost? Are you shitting me? He’s obviously been sent to spy on us…”
Brian suspected Strife felt the same way. She kept glancing from the fax to Ned, as though she didn’t want to let him out of her sight for so much as a second.
“Might I reclaim my code?” Horace asked. “You’ve been using it for some time now…”
Brian turned to face him. “I just need it another—” He cut off mid-sentence, eyes watering again. “Satan’s scrotum, that is foul…”
“I beg pardon,” Horace said, looking a little embarrassed. “It is the scent of garos, a sauce prepared with fermented fish. They served it at a feast downstairs years ago…” Horace’s tongue flicked over what was left of his lips. “I hadn’t tasted it since I was a youth… I simply could not resist sampling it once more! But regrettably, the odour lingers.”
“Since when were you invited to feasts downstairs?” Brian asked, intrigued, but before Horace could answer, Sarah cut across him.
“Okay so, is it just me, or is the new guy actually pretty cute?”
“Don’t you mean the new ghost?” Brian asked. “You couldn’t even say the word without retching before! And now you’re keen on him?”
Sarah twirled her ‘braid’ between her fingers. “His skin is, like, glowing…”
Brian threw his hands in the air. “BECAUSE HE’S A GHOST!”
Sarah gagged a little. “Yeah, that’s a turn-off for sure, but it’s not a dealbreaker.”
“Oh really?” Brian asked, incredulous.
“Not when you have hair like that. I mean, just look at it! It’s so poofy!”
Brian glanced over at Ned, who was spinning an inch off the ground, still looking for somewhere to sit.
“I suppose it does have some puff to it alright,” Brian admitted. “But that doesn’t mean you should—”
“Yoohoo!” Sarah cried.
Brian quickly pulled his jacket off and draped it over the back of Ennis’ chair. “Are you mad, woman? The last thing we need is a gho—”
“Over here, silly!” Sarah waved.
Ned took one look at the telephone cords stapled to her skull and went translucent.
“Aw, he’s shy!” Sarah giggled.
“Sure he is,” Brian muttered as Ned reappeared.
The ghost did one last, desperate sweep of the room before reluctantly hovering over. “Um… Is that seat—”
“Free?” Sarah asked, batting her single remaining eyelid so rapidly it looked like she was having a seizure. “Why, ye—”
“No!” Brian blurted. “It’s taken.”
“Oh, for fuck’s sake!” Sarah said, finally noticing his jacket. She snatched it off the back of Ennis’ chair so forcefully it tore along the top left shoulder.
Brian’s mouth hung open. He’d had that jacket since his first day in hell…
Sarah flung it at him. “Take a seat, Ned!” she said, batting her eyelid some more.
“You’re after making a hole in it!” Brian complained, fingering the rip in his jacket as Ned floated over and ‘sat’ at Ennis’ desk.
“Oh my devils, don’t be such a baby about it,” Sarah said, tapping Ned on the shoulder. Her hand went right through him and she laughed in delight.
“Please don’t do that,” Ned said.
Predictably, Sarah ignored the request. “Wanna see my Play-Doh collection?” she asked, hand somewhere inside his torso.
Before Ned could answer, Strife reappeared in a pair of indigo peep-toes and started shouting at the gremlins to update the board. The creatures had been sleeping atop one another in a pile, snoring. When they didn’t respond, Strife removed one of her heels and hurled it at them. She then scrunched the fax into a ball and hurled that too. “Scoreboard!”
“Scoreboard, scoreboard!” the creatures repeated in mocking tones as they got to work moving names about.
“Congratulations Brian, you’re no longer our bottomest agent,” Strife said.
“You know that’s not a word, right?” Brian asked. “Bottemest?”
Strife ignored him. “Congratulations Fred, our new bottomest agent. Hopefully—”
Ned raised his hand. Strife saw, but pressed on.
“Hopefully you won’t be bot—”
Ned cleared his throat loudly.
Strife closed her eyes and took a deep breath. “Yes?”
“Um… My name is Ned, not Fred.”
Strife gave him a withering look. “Hopefully you won’t be bottomest for long, Ned,” she said through gritted teeth. “I had a little speech planned, but with these constant interruptions?” She shook her head, then barked: “Back to work, every demon!”
The room filled with the sound of furious typing, and Strife turned to go back into her office.
“Um…”
It was Ned. Again.
Strife turned on her single peep-toe heel. “Yes?”
“On the subject of work… What exactly is it that we do?” Ned asked.
Strife pinched the bridge of her nose. “We’re Torment Services. We torment people… You did complete the induction?”
Ned made a face. “Technically, yes…”
“Technically?” Strife echoed, over-enunciating each syllable.
“Well, it was all a little overwhelming… what with suddenly finding myself incorporeal… and, you know, in hell…” Ned shrugged. “And I was sort of distracted by those weird little goblins, you know?”
“They’re gremlins, not goblins,” Sarah pointed out. “I make these little Play-Doh versions. Aren’t they just adorable?”
Ned jerked away as she waved one in his face.
“Sarah!” Strife cried.
“What? I’m just trying to be friendly! Here,” she said, thrusting the figure through Ned’s midsection. It was pink, and posed mid-cartwheel, erection on full display. “For you. Think of it as a welcome present!”
“I couldn’t possibly…” Ned said, shaking his head. “And please don’t—”
“For hell’s sake, just take it!” Strife snapped, and he begrudgingly placed the thing on the outermost edge of his desk.
“You’re welcome!” Sarah chirped, and Ned edged his desk away from her.
“Brian, get him set up and show him the ropes,” Strife said, turning towards her office a second time.
“Set up on what?” Brian asked. “He doesn’t have a computer.”
Strife whirled around so fast she almost lost her balance. “Why the heaven not?”
“Because Ennis took theirs with them,” Brian said, the word ‘obviously’ on the tip of his tongue.
Strife clicked her fingers at the gremlins until one of them brought over the peep-toe she’d fired at them. “So go get another one from IT!”
Brian looked around. “What, me?”
“Yes, you!” Strife snapped as she slipped the shoe on.
“But IT is all the way…”
Strife went back into her office and shut the door.
“…upstairs,” Brian protested, staring after her.
“I can help Ned get settled in while you’re gone!” Sarah exclaimed. “We’ll have the time of our deaths!”
“Um… That’s okay,” Ned said quickly, “I’ll just—”
“Don’t be silly!” Sarah leaned forward to pat him on the arm and giggled when her hand passed right through.
“Please don’t…” Ned started to say, then slumped his shoulders in defeat as she repeated the motion over and over.
“Why should I be the one to go?” Brian asked. “That’s hardly fair!”
“Yeah, well, death’s a bitch,” Sarah said, taking the back of his chair and rolling it towards the door.
“Hey!” he cried, gripping either side of the seat as she sent it spinning out into the corridor.
“Toodles!” she waved.
Brian was screwed.
Even if he made it back from IT in one piece—which seemed unlikely, given the rumours—there was no way his Torment Score would recover from the time away from his desk. His only hope was that Ned turned out to be utterly incompetent. And while that wasn’t likely, it wasn’t impossible either. But Sarah had clearly taken a liking to him—despite his being a ghost—which meant she’d do anything she could to keep him around, including lending him the FLIES code… And that thought brought Brian full circle: he was, indeed, screwed.
He wasn’t sure what they did with ‘bottom-quality agents,’ exactly. A demotion probably. Torture, most definitely. He thought back to his flaying and shuddered. He couldn’t go through something like that again. He had to turn things around somehow…
He had to run.
He’d sprint to the elevator, make his way up to IT, grab the first computer he could find and get the heaven out of there. Then Sarah could get Ned set up, given how enamoured she was with him, and Brian could focus on getting his numbers up. He could do this! He just had to run. Hopefully his body remembered how…
He took a deep breath and started to jog. In no time at all his calves and quads burned like they’d been drenched with holy water, and his trousers chafed against the exposed muscles, making them bleed. Just when he thought things couldn’t get any worse, gremlins started following him down the corridors.
“See how they run!” a splotchy yellow one cried, and the others joined in, chanting the line over and over, their voices high-pitched and horribly out-of-tune.
“Get—out—of—here!” Brian panted, trying to shoo the creatures away, but they swerved just out of reach, cackling madly.
“See how they run! See how they run!” they continued, all the way to the elevator.
Brian pressed the call button repeatedly as the gremlins linked hands and started dancing about him in circles.
“They all run after the maggotmonger’s wife!” a purple one belch-sang.
“We should cut off its tail with a carving knife!” the one next to it exclaimed just as the elevator doors finally opened.
“Yes! Yes! Yes!” the others cried with alarming enthusiasm. “Cut off its tail!”
“I don’t even have a tail!” Brian cried, backing into the elevator.
“Booooooo!!!!” the gremlins jeered.
Before Brian could press the Door Close button, one of them lunged at the panel, jabbing as many buttons as they could reach. Brian’s heart sank as dozens of floors lit up…
He was going to be stuck in the elevator for a very, very long time.
“You little—”
The gremlin ducked back into the hallway and stuck a teensy tongue out at him just as the doors slid closed.
#
Thanks to the gremlins, the elevator went down instead of up, stopping at so many floors that Brian lost count. The first few looked almost identical to his, but the deeper the elevator went, the more lavish things got. The changes were subtle at first—higher-pile carpeting, plastered ceilings instead of the square white tiles Brian was used to, spotlights as opposed to fluorescent panels and so on, but there was a marked difference from the 31st floor down. The corridors were wallpapered in flame-patterned red, and the doors and woodwork looked like mahogany rather than the laminate stuff Brian was used to.
From the 41st floor down, the oil paintings had gilded gold frames and the spotlights were replaced with ornate fixtures that cast everything in a warm amber glow. Brian couldn’t imagine what things were like from the 91st floor down… Thankfully the gremlin hadn’t been able to reach that low on the control panel. Brian would’ve been stuck in the elevator for an age if it had, and he would have been tortured for sure—the lower levels were strictly for upper management, after all.
Brian thrust his hand out suddenly, wedging it between the elevator doors as something outside caught his eye—a directory board. Or rather, a name on the board.
“No way!” he exclaimed, stepping out of the elevator to get a closer look. He ran a finger along the gilded lettering, hardly able to believe what he was seeing. “They have their own office!” he said, and peeked around the corner hoping to get a glimpse. “Wait until I tell—” he cut off midsentence as the elevator doors started to close behind him. “No, no, no—” he cried, rushing back, but it was too late; they slid shut with a soft click.
“Son of a saint…” he muttered, hitting the call button over and over.
“Yeah, it’ll pwobably be a while,” a wobbling, dual-tone voice said over Brian’s shoulder. “Der’sh shome short of function downshtairsh.”
Brian spun around, yelping in surprise. “It’s you!”
“What’sh me?” the giant slime asked before swallowing a pink-iced donut whole. They had an entire tray of the things.
“It’s… you… You’re…”
The slime gulped down a second donut, not even bothering to chew. It slid down their semi-transparent green throat before settling next to the first one, the edges of which had started to dissolve.
“Bob the blob!” Brian whispered, awestruck.
“What wash dat?” the slime asked, turning their head to one side and forming an oversized ear.
“I mean, Gormandizer!” Brian blurted. “You’re Gormandizer…”
“Dat’sh me,” they said, ear vanishing. “An’ you are?”
“…the archduke of the fetid wastes!” Brian stammered.
“Shtill me. Or at leasht it wash. My own shplitter poishend an’ replayshed me—can you beliewe dat?” Gormandizer snorted.
“And you’ve been employee of the month six hundred and twenty-three months in a row!” Brian gushed, his words tumbling out now that he’d recovered from the shock of meeting Torment Service’s top agent in the flesh—or in the slime, rather.
“They gave you your own office and all… A TSA with their own office!”
Gormandizer stretched their mouth into a wide, toothless smile. “It hash been known to happen…”
“It has?” Brian asked. “Wait, you don’t have a new neighbour named Ennis, by any chance?”
“Afwaid not,” Gormandizer said, shaking their head left to right.
“They got enlisted in some sort of ‘Descent Programme,’” Brian explained. “Either that or they were demoted, I’m not sure…”
Gormandizer gave a hearty belly laugh and their entire body rippled, making their facial features move about a little. “Ah yesh,” they said once their mouth had settled back in place. “De whole ‘promote de worsht, demote de besht,’ philoshophy—jusht one of de many waysh dey torture ush in dish playsh.”
Brian shifted uncomfortably. “What’s that now?”
“I’m shorry, I didn’ cash your name,” Gormandizer said, leaning in. They smelled like aniseed drops.
“I’m employee #42,586,619,118,” Brian said, extending a hand.
Gormandizer sucked their eyeballs inside their head and they reappeared on their stomach a moment later, level with Brian’s badge. “Yeah, I dink I’ll jusht call you Brian,” they said, shaking his hand.
Brian tried not to grimace at the unsettling squishiness of their touch. “As ye like, archduke.”
“Pleash, call me Gorm!” they said, and draped an arm over Brian’s shoulder, smearing his torn jacket with neon ooze. “Come wid me, my shkinlesh fwend. Der’sh shome-ding you hawe to shee.”
#
Gorm’s office was dominated by a large, ornate pedestal table piled with eight flickering monitors, stacked in a 4x2 grid. They emitted a constant buzzing sound and a light so garish it left afterimages on Brian’s retinas, yet he couldn’t tear his eyes away from them. Each one showed a different office from his floor, giving a rare glimpse of Torment Service’s other TSAs.
Some teams had been flayed like his own, others had been badly burned, and others still had charred black pits where their eyes should have been, which somehow didn’t seem to affect their vision—they sat at their desks, typing away just like any other demon.
But the monitors didn’t just show TSAs. They showed the ghouls in the filing department, buried in paperwork, and even the ghosts in the control room, hovering in place as they reviewed the security feed. Brian wondered if the ghosts had any idea they, too, were being watched.
“Sho, you shee what I’m shaying, right?” Gorm asked.
“Ah, not really, no…” Brian said, looking a little sheepish.
Gorm smacked his forehead so hard his hand sank in and got stuck. “Come on, dey’re clearly being tortured!”
“They are?” Brian asked, unable to hide the scepticism from his voice.
“We are. Ewery shingle one of ush—you, me, my manager…” Gorm pulled their hand back out of their head with a loud shlurp. “My manager’sh manager… Id go-sh all de way do de dop.”
“Ah, sure it’s hard to know…” Brian said, wondering how he might extricate himself from this situation. Who would have thought Gormandizer, Archduke of the Fetid Wastes, employee of the month six hundred and twenty-three months in a row, would turn out to be such a conspiracy nut?
“Dink about it,” Gorm said, steepling their fingers so that the tips merged into one another. “You’re forshed to do de shame ding, day after day for eternity, in de shame dull grey room wid de shame dull grey demonsh—demonsh who’we been deliberately playshd neksht to you becaushe of dare unique ability to driwe you mad.”
“The demons are mostly red, not grey, see? Owing to the lack of skin…” Brian said, pointing at his face. “And, sure, they’d drive any demon up the wall!”
“But you more dan mosht,” Gorm said, and opened a folder on their desktop labelled TSNodeList. They searched for his employee number, and sure enough, there were several hits. “Take a look at dish,” they said, opening one of the documents.
“Right so,” Brian said, humouring them. “Employee #7,237,619,118, onboarding date—”
“Shkip to de lisht of pet peewes,” Gorm instructed.
Brian laughed. “Pet peeves? There’s no list of…” he trailed off, choking on his own words.
“Allow me den,” Gorm said, clearing their throat theatrically. “‘Ped peewes: loud talkersh, pungent aromash, female audority figuresh, gremlinsh…’ Deesh wouldn’t happen to be dingsh you’re forshed to contend wid on a daily bay-shish, by any chansh?”
Gremlinsh. In his final moments, he’d seen one sitting atop the carriage that had run him over, laughing maniacally as the life drained from his body. But it wasn’t personal. Gremlins had a hand in every death…
Didn’t they?
Gorm waved a hand in front of his face. “Yo! Hell to Brian! You okay der buddy?”
“I beg your pardon,” Brian said, shaking all thoughts of gremlins from his head. “I was in a world o’ me own.”
“Dinking about de ped peewes lishd?”
“Yeah… I mean, I do suffer from the old auditory hypersensitivity—olfactory too,” Brian said, tapping his nose. “There’s a fellow sits behind me—Horace, he’s called—and his breath’s rotten altogether, so that’s a bit of bad luck. And as for loud talkers, there’s a girl called Sarah who sits behind me—she does be yammering away the whole time, and don’t get me started on Gertie!”
Brian paused for a moment. “And I suppose my boss is a woman, so the whole ‘female authority figures’ angle is covered as well, but sure having a woman as your boss is as likely as not. Unless you count the non-binary folk like yourself, of course… And well we should!” Brian added hastily. To his relief, Gorm didn’t seem to take offence. “It’s all just a coincidence is what I’m trying to say. I wouldn’t go reading into it.”
“Howash, huh?” Gorm asked, a faraway look in their multi-coloured, asymmetrical eyes. “It’sh no coinshidensh, I assure you. Take me, for ekshample. My ped peewes are buzzing noishesh an’ bright lightsh, hensh dish shet up,” they said, indicating the monitors. “We’re all being tortured, ewen de managersh. An’ not jushd wid ped peewes! We’re ashigned a kaysh worker to torture ush drew-out de day too!”
“Ah now,” Brian said, pulling a face. “That’s even more far-fetched…”
“Demonsh deesh daysh… Sho shtubborn,” Gorm sighed, pulling up an internal directory. “I’ll jusht hawe to proowe it to you…”
“Ah… Another time, perhaps? I’ve to—”
“What’sh your manager’sh name?” Gorm cut across him.
“Strife,” Brian said, cursing inwardly. Why couldn’t he have just played along? At this rate he’d never get to IT!
“Shtwife…” Gorm muttered, hitting a few keys until two files appeared on his screen side-by-side. The first had a picture of Strife. The second showed a demon with blue-white skin and a head covered in spiky crystals… “Her kaysh worker ish an eye-sh wraid called Mandy from de fifty-shecond floor. Mandy’sh you-shing PRY-SH-HIKE to raishe de cosht of shome shoesh Shtwife wash jusht about to buy. She’sh been doing it all day.”
Brian started. “You’re saying the codes work on manager’s too?” he asked, leaning in to get a closer look at Strife’s file. It said her human name had been ‘Serenity.’ Serenity!! She must have had it changed when she got sent to Hell.
“Oh yesh!” Gorm exclaimed, grinning. “I yoush dem on my manager all de time! You jusht need der Node ID an’ a computer wid a high enough akshesh lewel. Look!”
Gorm copied something from a file in the TSNodeList folder and ran it with the RAIN CLOUD code. One of the monitors on their desk flickered, and a goat-headed demon came into view. It sat in a tiny cubicle, typing at its computer as a dark, grey cloud appeared overhead. The goat demon looked up at it and bleated: “For hell’s sake Gorm, I know it’s you! It’s ahhhhh-lways you!”
Rain started to pour, and Gorm burst into hysterics as the goat-headed demon shook a hoof up at the ceiling.
“I don’t believe it!” Brian said, eyes glued to the screen.
“Try for yourshelf!” Gorm said between fits of giggles, and passed the keyboard over.
“Em… no thank you. I’ve enough problems with the lower-downs as it is.”
“Dey won’t mind!” Gorm insisted. “Dey lowe torture! It’sh kind of dare whole ding!”
Gorm had a point there, but Brian thought it best to use Horace’s code just to be on the safe side. He input it one letter at a time so that only one of his fingers had to come into contact with the keyboard, which was covered in slime. He then hit F3 several times to run the code over and over. Onscreen, the goat-headed demon was suddenly besieged with flies.
“GORM!!” it bleated, ears twitching. “FLIES? REALLY?! YOU KNOW HOW MY KIND DESTESTS THEM! YOU GO TOO FAR GORM!! AHHHH-LWAYS YOU GO TOO FAR!!”
Gorm laughed so hard their body lost its shape completely, melting to the floor in all directions.
“Satan save us!” Brian cried, leaping to his feet and retreating towards the door, away from the entreating ooze.
“FLY-SH! Dat’sh a good one!” Gorm said as their body reformed. At first, it was nothing but a great, featureless blob. But once it grew a head, the face started to take shape… The mouth moved into place, and then the eyes… Meanwhile, two tendrils of slime stretched out, hands forming at the ends and finally fingers. Gorm gave them a little wiggle before turning back to their computer.
“Completely underpowered, of coursh, but shtill good.” Gorm closed the goat-headed demon’s file and the monitor that had been showing their cubicle went dark. “I mean, why hawe Torment Sherwish Ashoshiatsh like you shend fly-sh when dey could hawe shome demon like me shend a plague? Or an eardquake?”
Brian had an answer for this, or at least, Strife did. “Well,” he said, his hand still gripping the door handle, “sometimes it’s the little things, the micro-annoyances that push people—”
“…ower de edge, shtraight into Shaytan’sh open anush, yeah yeah,” Gorm said, cutting him off. “Shtandard corporate jargon. It’sh complete larwa dwoppingsh. Dey giwe you shitty code-sh on purposh to make your work feel meaninglesh an’ unfulfilling.”
“Nonsense! Sure, I’m having the time of my death, so I am.”
Gorm turned in their chair and their eyes popped out on little stalks. “You mean you like being a Tee-Esh-Ay? Your kaysh worker musht be doing a wheeley bad job den. I wonder who you’we got…” They pulled up some more windows on their computer. “You’re not wobbling my belly? You wheeley like de work?”
Brian shrugged. “Sure it’s a bit of fun, isn’t it? Torturing people, I mean.”
An employee ID photo appeared on Gorm’s screen. It looked like some sort of deranged wombat wearing a top hat.
“Oh, I know dish girl,” Gorm chuckled. “She couldn’ giwe a fuuuuck… You lucked out my shkinlesh fwend!”
“Well, I don’t know about that. My manager keeps reminding me I’m ‘bottemest agent’… Satan knows what will become of me.”
“Ah, shtack ranking… Anuder delightful form of workplaysh torture!” Gorm said, giving a wide, gummy grin. “Wan’ my advyshe?”
Brian had a feeling Gorm was going to give it no matter what. Sure enough, the slime stretched their mouth all the way over to him on a tendril of ooze and whispered: “Jusht ignore it.”
“Just… ignore it?” Brian echoed.
“Sure,” Gorm said, retracting their mouth. “What’sh de worsht dat could happen?”
Brian stared at him. “Oh, I don’t know Gormandizer, demotion… having one’s entrails ripped out, or maybe one’s still-beating heart… They’d probably make me eat it!”
Gorm gave another belly laugh, sending his face parts jiggling. “Good one-sh! Ewer conshidered a career in Demon Re-shore-shesh? Dey love doling out corporate punishment—de more creatiwe de better!”
Brian scowled.
“Sherioushly dough, dey would pwobably jusht promote you. Down, an’ down an down’ until you’re right on de lowesht lewel, wid an offish owerlooking a riwer of molten lawa. An’ den one day, dey would send you back to orientation—miksh you in wid a classh of new hire-sh, an’ you would find yourshelf a Tee-Esh-Ay wonsh more! It’sh de shy-kle of dead…”
“The cycle of death?” Brian asked, incredulous.
“What, you don’t beliewe me?” Gorm asked, their tone turning bitter. “Ashk your fwend Howash—he youshed to be my manager.”
“They’re fucking with you,” Brian muttered to himself. He was back in the elevator, which, thankfully, was going up this time instead of down. His progress was still painfully slow, though. The elevator kept stopping on random floors. Brian poked his head out every now and then, expecting to see a giggling gremlin at the call button, but all he found were eerily empty hallways.
A horrifying thought struck, making Brian stiffen. What if the stops weren’t random at all? What if they were being orchestrated by this supposed ‘case worker’ of his—the wombat? She was probably watching him right now, laughing her arse off at his slow progress. Brian cast a furtive glance up at the ceiling, but he couldn’t see any cameras—whatever surveillance method Torment Services used to monitor its employees, it was invisible… at least to him.
“They’re fucking with you…” he said again. “There’s no ‘pet peeves’ list… No ‘cycle of death,’ and there are no case workers…” Brian raised his chin and clasped his hands behind his back, determined not to let Gorm get to him. It was just a coincidence. All of it—having a female manager, being seated close to a pair of loudmouths like Gertie and Sarah… And as for the whole ‘pungent aromas’ thing, who wouldn’t be put out by Horace’s bad breath? Brian very much doubted Gormandizer had actually met the guy, but even if the pair had crossed paths at some stage, there’s no way Horace was ever a manager.
Brian shook his head, letting out a little laugh. “Good one Gorm!” he cried aloud. “You almost had me there!” He hit the #001 floor button three times in a row. “Almost had me…” he repeated, but with less conviction this time around. He glanced up at the floor display and sighed. “Should have taken the stairs… And a weapon, come to think of it.”
No demon messed with IT. You were given a computer as a new hire—or a typewriter in Brian’s case—and you made sure to keep it in working order until your manager decided you were due an upgrade, which was almost never. Half of hell still ran on pen and paper. They said it was because certain ‘sensitive’ documents needed to be written in blood, but Brian suspected the real reason was that no demon wanted to deal with IT. Satan knows he didn’t… The only reason Strife had Brian’s team go digital was that it meant she could spend most of her time online shopping.
The elevator finally arrived at the first floor, doors sliding open with a little ding.
Brian sighed. “Let’s have done with it.”
#
The corridor was, by far, the ugliest Brian had seen. The carpet was vomit-coloured, with a vertigo-inducing pattern of swirls that didn’t line up at the seams. The walls were made from thin plasterboard, painted a bland off-white/cream, and large strip lights hung from the ceiling, casting everything in a garish, flickering fluorescent light.
A small directory board was mounted across from the elevator. In addition to the usuals, like a control room and a break room (yes, apparently there was one on every floor), it listed something called ‘Egress,’ an orientation room, several training rooms, a server room and IT. Some demon had circled the latter in red felt-tip pen and scrawled the words ‘ENTER AT YOUR OWN RISK’ underneath.
Brian started towards it, taking the long way around so as to avoid security. Most of the rooms he passed were empty, and all was quiet save for a weird, intermittent swooshing noise he couldn’t quite place. It got progressively louder as he made his way down the corridor, which eventually opened out into a large hall. IT and the server room were on one side, with the orientation room and training rooms on the other.
Some ornate double doors stood directly opposite him, flanked by a pair of looming, ten-foot-tall gargoyle statues. A bakelite nameplate was affixed to the wall next to them, reading: ‘Egress.’
Brian froze, a sudden, unsettling sense of déjà vu creeping over him.
He’d seen doors like that before, but only once.
“Surely not…” he breathed, slowly turning to take in the wall behind him, where a floor-to-ceiling mural depicted scores of humans being tortured in every imaginable way and then some, all under the watchful eye of a red-skinned, horned Satan. The words ‘Welcome to Hell!’ were painted in large, crimson letters across the top.
“Hah!” he cried, taking a moment to admire it before his gaze shifted back to the doors. They were a thing of beauty in their own diabolical way, with a raised pattern of gilded gold flame interwoven with pitchforks and… were those gremlins? Brian stole closer, half-expecting to be confronted by a ghost, but none appeared. It was just him, the gargoyle statues, and, yes, gremlin reliefs. They were almost cherub-like, except for the demented grins and pointy ears. Brian hadn’t noticed the carvings on his way into hell, but to be fair, he’d had a lot to process at the time.
He gave a quick glance over his shoulder and reached for one of the handles, bracing himself for searing pain, or perhaps some sort of shrieking alarm, but it turned with only a small squeak. The doors opened to reveal plush, red-carpeted stairs, at the top of which sat Hell’s answer to the pearly gates: a gothic, revolving door with barred windows and a large medallion bearing the Torment Service’s logo. ‘Sentencing Commission—Regional Office’ was written across the canopy in shiny, raised gold letters.
“Surely not…” Brian said again as he climbed the stairs for a better look. He could see humans milling about outside, utterly oblivious to the hellscape right beneath their feet. “I never thought to see the like—”
His words caught in his throat as he saw his own demonic reflection in the glass—and that of the gargoyle hovering in the stairwell right behind him.
“Feck. Feck, feck, feck…”
The gargoyles had come to life. Of course they’d come to life! Had Brian really thought they’d leave the entrance to hell unguarded? The entrance that was also an exit?!
“Ah… ‘Tis yourself!” Brian said, voice shaking as he turned and looked up into the gargoyle’s glowing red eyes. “And here I was thinking you were nothing but a big ornament…” he said with a nervous laugh. “How foolish of me!”
The gargoyle loomed over him, so close the smell was overpowering. It was like sour yoghurt with undernotes of charcoal.
Brian raised a hand to his nose. “You might be wondering what a TSA such as myself is doing in the stairwell… Before you go thinking I’m trying to run off or something, I do have leave to be here… Well, not here, here, but to be on this floor. Or, on the floor down the stairs, anyway… I only came up for a look at the humans, so I did.”
The gargoyle pulled its lips back in a snarl, revealing a mouth full of jagged, flint teeth.
“Whoah-kay,” Brian said, backing against the wall and tiptoeing around the creature. “I’ll make myself scarce…”
Brian inched his way back down the stairs as the gargoyle remained hovering in place, glowing red eyes watching his every step. Just as Brian reached the bottom a gravelly voice over his shoulder rasped: “WHERE ITS SKIN?”
“Satan’s sweaty, sweaty sack,” Brian cursed.
The second gargoyle was standing right in the doorway, blocking his retreat.
“NO SKIN!” the first gargoyle said in an equally grating tone as it swept to the bottom of the stairs with a single flap of its wings.
“NO SKIN MEAN FOOD!” the second one spat, flecking the back of Brian’s head with little globs of muddy saliva. “IS FOOD?”
“Is NOT!” Brian cried, spinning around.
The gargoyle looked down at him and huffed, sending a gust of scalding hot air from its nostrils.
“By Lucifer, that burns!” Brian cried, eyes watering with pain.
“IS MAYBE FOOD…” the first one mused. “IS MAYBE TROUBLE. EAT TROUBLE, BANG BANG.”
“NO BANG BANG!” the second one insisted. “NO TROUBLE! NO SKIN MEANS FOOD! IS FOOD!!”
Brian ducked under its legs and made a run for it, but he didn’t get far. One of the gargoyles slammed into his back, knocking him to the floor and pinning him beneath its bone-crushing weight.
“Are you made of stone, then?” he wheezed. “Because you smell more like a hormonal bab—”
There was a sudden, loud pop, and the gargoyles let out an ear-piercing shriek. The one straddling him jumped to the ceiling, digging its claws into the Styrofoam tiles. The other flew down the corridor crying: “BANG BANG BITCHES!! BANG BANG!!”
“Ohhhhh-kay…” Brian said, rolling over as crumbling Styrofoam rained to the floor all around him. Up above, the remaining gargoyle clung to the metal runners between the tiles, a terrified look on its face. There was a second pop, and it yelped, almost losing its hold.
Brian sat up on his elbows. “Mind yourself! I’d say it’s only—”
“IS BANG BANG BITCHES!” the gargoyle cried.
“What in hell’s name is a bang—”
There was a third pop, and the gargoyle scampered up into the darkness above the tiles, disappearing from sight.
Brian stared after it for a moment, then slowly pulled himself to his feet. He’d avoided the biggest chunks of Styrofoam, but he was still coated in the stuff. He started brushing himself off, then suddenly stopped.
The doors… They were unguarded.
He could leave!
Just walk right up those stairs and out into the street… He could be free of this place. Staying free would be the hard part. It wasn’t exactly easy to blend in when you had no skin. But it wasn’t impossible, either. There were plenty of stories of demons living among humans—even the more overtly grotesque ones.
Until this moment, the thought of escape hadn’t even crossed his mind. He liked being a demon. Liked tormenting humans. Would it really be that much more fun in person? And even if it was, would it be worth the risk?
If he were caught, they wouldn’t just torture him—they’d torture every demon who’d ever had anything to do with him. Ennis, Sarah, Horace… even the new guy. And definitely Gorm. Heaven, they’d probably think the whole thing had been Gorm’s idea.
The swooshing noise started up again, followed by another loud pop.
“What is that?” Brian muttered, turning his back on the double doors and following the sound.
“Satan’s scrotum!” a squeaky, high-pitched voice cried from the orientation room.
“Don’t be gremlins, don’t be gremlins, don’t be gremlins…” Brian whispered as he nudged the door open and peered inside.
It wasn’t gremlins. It was a demon trying to stretch a balloon over the nozzle of a helium tank. The floor around them was littered with dozens upon dozens of burst ones… all red, with the Torment Services pitchfork printed on one side.
“And Lucifer’s left testicle to go with it!” the demon muttered, kicking the tank onto its side.
“Ennis?” Brian asked.
They tilted their head back, brown eyes glinting under the rim of their fedora. “Compay!” they exclaimed, jumping to their feet and holding up a hand expectantly.
Brian high-fived them. “Ennis! It is you! I wasn’t sure there on account of the creepy gremlin voice you were doing.” He looked down at the tank. “Have you been inhaling that stuff?”
“Only between balloons… Or between attempted balloons, rather,” Ennis said, their voice already dropping back to its normal register. “I’m supposed to hang two hundred of them before the new hires arrive.”
Brian prodded one of the burst latex shells with his foot. “How’s that going?”
Ennis sighed, righting the helium tank. “One moment,” they said, holding up a finger.
Brian watched with a puzzled expression as they put the tank’s nozzle in their mouth and drew in a long, deep breath.
“Ah…” Brian began, but Ennis raised their finger again.
They held their breath for a moment, then exhaled in a sudden rush. “Going great!” they said, voice comically high-pitched once more. “Having the time of my death over here, but if you want to lend a hand…” They trailed off, offering Brian the nozzle.
He affixed a balloon to it and released the tank’s valve just enough to let the helium trickle out. “So, this is your job now?” he asked, glancing down at Ennis’ new badge. “‘Orientation Officer’s Assistant’?”
“Marvelous, isn’t it? I’ve descended!” they cried happily.
“And yet, you’ve gone upstairs instead of down…” Brian pointed out, before pinching the top of the ballon, neatly knotting it closed and letting it fall to the ground.
“Don’t be jealous!” Ennis said, attaching another balloon to the nozzle. “It’s not too late for you to sign up.”
“I’ll pass, thanks,” Brian replied, the words coming out a little more forcefully than he’d intended. He eased Ennis’ balloon off of the nozzle before it burst like the others, then tied it off. “I thought you had og… glog… glob…”
“Globophobia,” Ennis sighed, face contorting in distaste as they slipped another balloon onto the nozzle.
“Right. So, what the heaven?” Brian scoffed. “How can this be better than working as a TSA?”
“Satan, they’re just balloons, Brian. Sure, I once had a mild phobia of them, but—” Ennis squealed in fright as the one they were inflating burst.
“You were saying?” Brian asked, stifling a laugh.
“Oh, fine,” Ennis said, giving him a scathing look. “You got me! I hate them. I hate the smell of them, the feel of them, the blasted way they ‘POP’… The only thing I hate worse are clow—” Ennis bit their tongue at the sight of a demon in the doorway.
It was a child, or near enough anyway. She wore a stained pink-and-yellow romper and a matching, equally stained conical hat with neon pom poms. She carried an oversized bear sporting a similar costume—although his looked like it had been set on fire at some point.
“What’s this, Spookie?” the girl asked, raising the bear to her face, which was caked with thick layers of make-up—clown make-up. “I thought we asked our assistant to hang two hundred balloons for the new hires! But I don’t see two hundred balloons… I see three balloons, just lying on the floor…”
“Oh, hi Mitsy!” Ennis said, giving a nervous laugh. “And… uh… Spookie…”
“It’s ‘Hello, Orientation Officer Mitsy, and hello, Deputy Spookie,’” the girl said, gliding towards them in a flurry of tiny, tiptoed steps, like some weird Pierrot-style ballerina. “You will address us by our official titles, or you will be returned to your previous position with a demerit.”
Ennis’ laugh climbed higher, bordering on hysteria. “You’re so funny. Isn’t she so funny?” they asked Brian, taking a step back and almost tripping over the helium tank in the process. It clattered to the floor and began to roll, each rotation filling the air with a grating metallic din.
Mitsy’s left eye twitched. “I am most certainly not ‘funny.’ See the teardrops painted on my cheeks? The exaggerated frown? My visage tells the new hires it’s okay to feel sad about leaving their old lives behind—it’s okay to feel sad about dying. In time they’ll adapt, like I have.”
Ennis laughed so hard they doubled over, clutching their mid-section. “The bitch is a riot! I can’t take it…”
Mitsy’s eyes went wide, and for a moment Brian thought she might physically strike Ennis.
He cursed inwardly and jumped between them. “They’re only messing! Back when they worked in my office, we called each other bitches all the time—every demon on the floor did!”
Somewhere overhead, a shrill voice howled: “BANG BANG BITCHES!!”
Mitsy frowned up at the ceiling before returning her gaze to Brian—specifically, to his badge. “Employee #42,586,619,118…” she mused, stepping so close Brian could see the cracks in her make-up. “Tell me, bitch, what’s a low-level Torment Service Associate like you doing in my Orientation Room?”
Brian swallowed and brought his thumb to his mouth, biting the nail, which was now almost to the quick. “I… em…” he mumbled around it.
“He came to help me with the balloons!” Ennis cut in, their fit of laughter finally easing off.
“What, no!” Brian said, looking from them to Mitsy, and then to the bear, which Mitsy raised menacingly towards him. The thing had one glass eye—eerily human—and a dangling thread where the other should have been.
“No?” Mitsy asked. “Only those assisting in the critical task of making this a welcoming space for our new hires are authorised to be here.” She made the bear tap its chin. “So, if you’re not assisting the assistant to the Orientation Officer, then some demon should really call security!”
One hundred and ninety-seven balloons later, Ennis walked Brian to IT. There was a poster tacked to the door that read: *✧ Pizza Party!! Bring your own Sombrero ✧* Beneath it, some demon had added: “No gods, no gargoyles, no fire demons, and ABSOLUTELY NO TSAs!!!” The last part was underlined three times.
“Good luck with that,” Ennis laughed, and turned to head back.
“Wait, wait!” Brian cried. “I thought you might go in for me? Seeing as you’re no longer a TSA…”
“Did you, now?” Ennis asked, raising a brow muscle.
“Sure, it’s your fault I’m in this mess in the first place… I mean, did you have to take your computer?”
“No, probably not,” Ennis admitted. “Mitsy gave me something called a ‘Blackberry.’ It’s like a pocket-sized version with absurdly small keys.” Ennis waved the thing unceremoniously for Brian to see, then slipped it back inside their jacket.
“Well, if you don’t need the old one… I could just take it back and then there’s no need for either of us to go inside,” Brian said hopefully.
“I don’t have it anymore,” Ennis shrugged. “It was heavy so I left it by the elevator.”
Brian frowned. “I didn’t see it on my way up here…”
“Gremlins got to it.” Ennis stuffed their hands into their pockets and rocked back and forth on their heels. “They forced the doors open and dropped it down the shaft.”
“Stupid gremlins…” Brian cursed. “Well, you owe me for helping out with the balloons, at least.”
“I would have gotten the hang of that eventually…”
“Sure you would,” Brian muttered.
Ennis crossed their arms, giving him a look.
“Do it as a favour, so. For your old work friend. Work bestie, even!”
“Fine. Beezlebug’s boner, you’re such a milksop sometimes,” Ennis chuckled, brushing passed him.
“Am not!” Brian cried. “It’s just that they’re, you know… Xeno—”
Ennis opened the door, and a wave of mariachi-meets-techno music poured out, thumping so loud it made Brian’s teeth rattle. A moment later, he was hit with the stench of ammonia, making him wish he could cover his nose and ears at the same time.
“The official term is ‘endoparasitoid extraterrestrial,’” Ennis shouted over the music. “It was covered in the Descent Programme’s workplace sensitivity training.”
“That training sounds like torture, so it does,” Brian shouted back. “Almost as bad as having you blow hundreds of balloons for a creepy clown child. A curious bit of work, given your phobias…”
Ennis grimaced, stepping into the semi-darkness of the IT room. The only light came from a retro arcade machine and the green glow of some LED keyboards and computer towers.
“I heard an interesting theory about that earlier,” Brian said, following close behind.
“An interesting theory about what?” Ennis asked, eyeing the arcade machine. Three tiny aliens manned the controls, bickering in a series of chittering clicks as the screen filled with pixelated, invading spaceships. A fourth perched on top, swaying its tail back and forth to the music. Like the others, it was roughly the size of an eggplant, with the same shiny blue-black skin—or maybe it was exoskeleton, Brian wasn’t sure. All four aliens wore miniature felt sombreros.
“About Torment Service’s propensity to torture its own staff,” Brian continued, giving the creatures as wide a berth as possible. “I met Gormand-aaaaaaaahhh!!!”
Brian gave a strangled cry as a segmented tail slid between his legs and rose up his torso, its razor-sharp tip pressing into the flesh beneath his chin. An ‘endoparasitoid extraterrestrial,’ had snuck up behind him—an adult sized one. It rested its elongated head on his shoulder, working its pharyngeal jaws right next to his face.
“Piiiizzzzaaaa bbooooyyyy??” it hissed, and Brian almost soiled himself.
“Easy there,” Ennis breathed as another one of the creatures emerged from the shadows wearing a wide-brimmed sombrero with gold trim.
“Annnd piiiizzzzaaa… ggiiiirrllll bbooooyyyy??” It reached for Ennis with long, slender fingers tipped with curved nails.
Ennis batted the hand away. “Assistant to the Orientation Officer,” they said, holding up their badge.
The alien sniffed at it, or something; it was hard to tell what was happening with that face. Then it did the same thing with Brian’s badge and started chittering angrily.
More sombrero-toting aliens emerged from the shadows, their shiny exoskeletons—or skin, or whatever—glistening in the darkness.
“Tteee… Esss… Ayyy…!!!!” the one with the gold-trimmed hat spat.
The speakers let out a crackling screech as the music abruptly cut out.
“Em…” Brian said, desperately trying to extricate himself from the one with its tail wedged between his legs. “Maybe we should—”
“NNNoooooooo GGggggooooddddzzzzzz,” his captor hissed, driving the tip of its tail deeper into his flesh.
“NNNoooooooo GGggggarrrr…. Ggggaaaarrrrr…. Ggggg… oyyy… oyyyllll… gggarrrggg…” gold-trim stammered, before shaking its head and skipping ahead to: “NNnnooooo Ttteeeee… Essss… Ayyyyyyzzz!!!!”
This was met with a chorus of hisses and snapping jaws.
“HE’S WITH ME!” Ennis roared, but the aliens started moving in—even the little ones from the arcade machine.
Brian wondered what it would be like to be torn apart. It would be painful, sure, but it wasn’t like he could die a second time… He’d just be stuck in a dismembered body. He tried to convince himself that wouldn’t be the end of the world, but then he thought of the gremlins. Those little shits would use his legs as pins and his head as a bowling bowl…
Feck that, Brian thought, as blood trickled down his neck. “If you’re going to eat me, then eat me whole, do you hear? Don’t go leaving bits of me lying around for gremlins to find.”
“Relax, ’chacho!” Ennis said, reaching for a switch on the wall.
Lights flickered on overhead, and the aliens shrieked, darting about for someplace to hide. And boy, were there places to hide—piles of old computers, fax machines, punch card readers, teleprinters, and Satan knows what else, tangled up with telephone cords, Ethernet cables, and wires Brian couldn’t even begin to identify. There was some alien tech in the mix, too—maybe even the remnants of a spacecraft—and the whole lot was bound together by some sort of sinewy, biomechanical jelly.
The tail tip at Brian’s throat whipped out of sight, and he turned just in time to see its owner duck into a large bin heaped with keyboards, computer mice and worn-looking headsets.
“The state of the place!” Brian exclaimed. “No wonder no demon comes in here, what with the smell, the racket, the mess… Not to mention these blaggards!” Brian said, wincing as he touched his neck.
“NNnnooooo Ttteeeee… Essss… Ayyyyyyzzz…” Gold-trim hissed again as the last few aliens scurried out of sight. “NNnnooooo Asssss…. Asssissss….”
Ennis yanked the nearest computer from the wall. “We’re taking this.”
“Asssisssttttaaaaannnn….”
“And this!” Ennis cried, dumping the computer onto an AV cart stacked with paper cups, rainbow-coloured napkins and yet more sombreros.
“SssisssttttaaaaannnntT…. OOhhhhRreeeeeee”
“No Assistant to the Orientation Officer, sí, sí, we get it,” Ennis said, shoving the cart towards the door. “Brian!” they yelled. “Let’s go!”
Brian looked from Ennis to Gold-trim. “Ah… I can’t exactly say it’s been a pleasure, but sure thanks for not eating me at least.”
Gold-trim gave him the finger.
#
“Remind me to never, ever leave my floor again.” Brian dabbed at his neck with one of the rainbow-coloured napkins from the AV cart, which Ennis had parked in front of the ‘Welcome to Hell’ mural.
“Oh come on, it’s not that bad,” they teased. “And for the record, they wouldn’t have eaten you. It’s not their thing.”
“Could have fooled me,” Brian muttered as Ennis swapped their fedora for one of the sombreros from the bottom of the cart. It was made from black velvet, covered in red and blue string art and dotted with sequins. “What do you think?” they asked, running their fingers along the brim and striking a pose. “New job, new hat!”
Brian looked away, not wanting to meet their eyes. “I prefer the old one.”
“Don’t be such a killjoy!” Ennis cried, pulling another sombrero from the cart. This one had little red tassels and ‘¡Viva Infierno!’ embroidered across the band. “We can be matching,” they teased, placing it on Brian’s head.
“We look ridiculous…” he grumbled.
“We look tops!” Ennis insisted, doing a little dance.
Brian shook his head, smiling as much as his flayed flesh would allow, but his expression quickly grew sombre. “I’m going to miss you,” he whispered, gaze falling to the floor.
“Don’t go getting all soft on me, milksop…” Ennis said, their voice quivering ever so slightly. “Seriously though, I’m only a few floors away. And who knows, maybe if you perform badly enough, you’ll get promoted like me! We could be back working together in no time.”
Brian couldn’t help but laugh.
Ennis raised a hand expectantly, and he gave them a high five.
“Well, slán, or adiós, if you will,” Brian began to say, when the double doors groaned open and a pigtailed human poked her head inside.
“Whoah, sick make-up!” she said, eyes wide. “Costume party?”
Brian and Ennis just stared at her.
“Well, I’ve got your pizzas,” she said, holding up two huge insulated delivery bags. “Twenty XL pepperonis, right?”
#
Strife jumped to her feet as Brian rolled the pizza-laden AV cart past the glass wall of her office and right up to his desk.
“What’s this?” she asked, running out in a pair of transparent, plastic wedges as heads peeked over monitors to see what was happening.
“Pizza party!” Brian exclaimed, tossing sombreros at his coworkers. One hit Raymond right in the face.
“I didn’t get any fax…” Strife said, planting her hands on her hips as demons descended on the cart.
“No?” Brian asked, feigning surprise. “They said it’s to celebrate the numbers we’ve been pulling.”
“The numbers we’ve been pulling?” Strife asked, tone suspicious.
Brian opened one of the pizza boxes right under her nose. Strife eyed the contents hungrily, nostrils flaring. Just as she went to take a slice Brian leaned in, his voice dropping to a whisper. “I mean, our numbers are good, aren’t they, Serenity?”
Strife froze, hand hovering midair.
“Mine especially,” Brian added. “And they’ll stay that way. Isn’t that right?”
Strife inhaled sharply, eye muscles twitching. “Your numbers are middling,” she said through gritted teeth and snapped the pizza box closed on his fingers.
Brian yelped.
“And they will stay middling so long as you keep your trap shut!” she said, yanking the pizza box from his grip and retreating to her office with it.
Brian hopped from one foot to the other clutching his pinched fingers to his chest as Sarah approached twirling her ‘braid.’
“So, don’t freak out or anything, but I set Ned up on your computer. You were just gone so long, you know? And he really wanted to get stuck in…” She trailed off, tilting her head in the new hire’s direction. “Look at him go!” she laughed, and mimed typing frantically at a keyboard. For his part, Ned resolutely ignored her. To Brian’s dismay, the ghost was already climbing the board, leaving him ‘bottemest’ again.
“Such a hard worker…” Sarah went on. “But there’s a lot to learn, obviously. I’ve been training him in, and it’s just easier sitting next to him than shouting instructions from the row behind, so…”
Sarah sank into Brian’s chair with an apologetic shrug.
“Seriously?” Brian asked.
“You and Horace get to be desk buddies, yay!” Sarah exclaimed, and pulled her exposed face muscles into a most unwinning smile.
“Well that’s just great, so it is…” Brian muttered as he transferred the computer he’d brought back from IT onto Sarah’s old desk, which reeked of Play-Doh and was covered in stains where the stuff had gotten smudged into the grain. Worse still, it was one row closer to Gertie, who was regaling every demon within shouting distance with a story about a lactose-intolerant Shih Tzu she once fostered.
Brian had heard this one before. They’d all heard it before... “I feel a headache coming on…” he groaned.
“From the noise, is it?” Horace asked, glancing about surreptitiously. “Try these!” he whispered, leaning over to drop a small packet onto Brian’s new desk.
“Satan’s scrotum…” Brian cursed, covering his nose.
“Ah… the smell,” Horace muttered. “I have nothing for that, I’m afraid.”
Brian picked up the packet. “Office Master High-Fidelity Earplugs,” he read aloud. “Where did you find these?”
“I acquired several crates of them long ago,” Horace said, waving a hand dismissively. “Back when I managed a team down on the 37th floor.”
Brian’s jaw dropped.
“Our office was right beside the comms department, which, as you know, is run by banshees…” Horace shuddered, making his double chin wobble. “If you find Gertie clamorous, try listening to those crones wail. It drove me and my team half mad, and our numbers suffered! So, as I said, I secured a shipment of those plugs and all was well!”
Brian continued to stare. “You were a manager?”
“Is it so difficult to believe?” Horace asked, sounding hurt.
“What? No!” Brian said a little too quickly. “It’s just… here you are, working as a TSA… How did that come about?”
“Ah! That is a long tale…” Horace replied. “Let it suffice that all which descends must ascend. Such is the circle of death.”
Brian slammed a hand down on his desk. “Gorm was right! About everything!”
“Ah, you have met Gormandizer, I take it? A highly capable employee… Did you know he was poisoned by his own splitter?” Horace sighed. “What an omniverse we live in!”
Brian just sat there in silence, trying to wrap his head around it all.
“I must return to my work,” Horace said eventually. “May the earplugs serve you well!”
Brian had forgotten about them completely. He tore the packet open and popped them in. Gertie’s ramblings instantly went from migraine-inducing to an almost soothing ambient white noise.
“Hah!” he said, looking about the place with newfound appreciation now that his coworkers no longer sounded so annoyingly loud. Even Sarah’s painfully awkward attempts at flirting were reduced to mere background chatter. “Sure, these are remarkable!”
Horace gave him a thumbs up, but kept his eyes fixed on his computer screen. Most demons had gone back to work, Brian noticed. Only Strife was still eating pizza. Her eyes met his through the glass wall of her office and she scowled.
“Ah, it was grand while it lasted,” Brian muttered, switching on his new computer.
The Torment Services pitchfork pulsed on the screen along with the words: Level 99 System. Initialising...
“Level ninety-nine?” Brian breathed, and clicked into a familiar folder on the desktop: TSNodeList.
They were all in there—every employee, every manager, every demon he’d ever crossed paths with. This computer must have belonged to one of the aliens working in IT. It probably had more permissions than Gorm’s. In which case, it would presumably let him use any code he wanted.
Brian’s eyes flicked back up to Strife’s office. She’d finally finished her pizza and gone back to shoe shopping.
“Let’s see what this machine can do…” he said, typing in her details and his chosen code before biting what was left of his lower lip and hitting Enter.
Nothing happened.
He ran the code again, and again, and again… Just when he was about to give up, Strife climbed onto her desk, screaming, as her office flooded with flies. They spewed from the fax machine, the phone, and even the carefully stacked shoeboxes, which tore open, flinging their contents across the room so that it rained heels.
“Gremlin—” Strife screeched, before bowling over as though she had something stuck in her throat. A fly, Brian supposed. So many swarmed around Strife he could hardly make her out.
His Torment Score skyrocketed.
“It’s like I always said, this job is grand once you have the right codes!” Brian chuckled.
Demons all around him jumped to their feet at the commotion, but he just leaned back in his chair, fingers laced behind his head. “I’m having the time of my death, so I am.”
END
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