Skinner's Cubicle (552 hits)
Category: Quotes & StoriesRating: 2 on 7 reviews (Rate this item) (V)
Submitted by Rabid Weasel <rbdweasel.at.yahoo.com> (View user info) at 2004-03-16 11:50:06 EST
The bed swung down and away from the wall dumping its occupant on the floor. His subconscious had been trained from the morning ejections of the last few weeks. He snapped at the last second, landing like a cat. In approximately 100 seconds, the shower would start running for a steamy, luxurious 7 minutes. 15 minutes afterward the front wall of his efficiency apartment would roll up and the transport would be waiting. He knew to be clothed and ready then to avoid not only embarrassment but the unpredictable harshness of March weather.
He was classified an H9 with certifications in software technology and creative writing. The creative writing cert was only for his own amusement and meant zero for job assignments, but it made him feel like he had a speck of independence. He felt The Corporation tolerated the art training only to placate the level 9s. A few intellectual pursuits in the curriculum were the minimum they would do to keep the capable minority sane. The Corporation heavily relied on technology so highly intelligent people were seen as a necessary evil.
This was not why he was stuck in H level housing. This was not why he had a miserable half job either. He assumed that many of the Corp's leaders had top intelligence scores, but were B quality behavior at least. He was rebellious and subject to seasonal mood swings so never achieved better than an E on any of his annual evaluations. In his last few jobs he had a habit of asking his superiors too many questions. He found no boss liked to be strongly questioned, especially by an inferior with a several point advantage in intelligence. It only took a year out of training to be demoted to an H which precipitated his special living quarters. He still felt lucky to have this job. Any H lower than 7 would be stuck with prison labor: mining, outdoor laboring. He hoped if his current job went well he could get reclassified to a G next year and return to an apartment with a simple alarm clock.
The transport slowed and door opened at his station. Elevator to basement level. Log into the system. The first debug project was waiting for him in the queue. He had a theory that most of these tasks were fake and he stared at one with all the qualities of an excuse to keep him from falling asleep at work. He imagined D9s in some other cubicle whose job it was to screw up good code to keep the H9s busy. He had seen a near exact copy of this mangled subroutine several days before so he quickly fixed the deliberate mistakes and pulled up the next task. Jackpot! This was a real cluster of crap code. Corporate belief was to hire As and Bs no matter what intelligence rating because their dedication and work ethic would eventually overcome their total lack of ability. The sap who wrote this was probably right out of Corporate training and completely lost. Not much choice than to write the entire thing over from scratch. This is where the mindless sycophants got their abilities: through an electronic nipple attached to a psycho.
He had nearly finished the rewrite when the break timer popped on the screen. He had 60 minutes to do whatever he wanted provided he stayed where he was and did not do work. He decided to check the H9 message boards. He had posted his ideas about most of his work being unnecessary and fabricated and was curious what the other crazies thought. Interesting. Not one comment or reply. That is strange. Usually somebody would at least flame him with random profanity. Unless. His head went numb and the pit of his stomach collapsed. "No, this is not that big of a deal. So what if my work is fake?" he knew that the H9 rooms were heavily monitored. Rebellious plus intelligent meant political subversive. Maybe he had crossed the line with that post. Hopefully nobody had noticed. Prophetically the entrance tone to his door rang and several men walked in.
"Good afternoon. Can we talk?" That was his boss, an extremely humor impaired B6. The other men he did not recognize, probably higher-ups or security reps. "How are your tasks going?"
"Pretty good. I am working on a major screwed-up piece right now, but it should work great once I am done with it." He was cursing himself internally halfway through the sentence. His smart-ass mouth was mostly to blame for his H ranking. He wondered why he could not just shut up.
"Yes." His boss drawled patronizingly. "Do you think it's real?"
Shit, shit, shit his head was swimming now. They read his post and it got somebody's attention. He figured it was time to back-peddle and hope.
"No, no, not this one." He wondered if his face appeared to wince as much as it felt.
"Oh, so which ones do you think are made up?"
"Well, it's not like I mind. The fake ones keep me sharp. They are a lot better than doing nothing." He wondered what happened to his plan of back-peddling. What he was saying was clearly not helping his situation.
Finally one of the Corporate thugs spoke. "The Corporation does not make fake work. It is all important for the good of the company. It is bad enough that you believe this crazy conspiracy theory, but trying to convince other employees that their work is meaningless is inexcusable. Do you know how many people have been complaining about you insulting their jobs? I am sorry, but for the good of the workers you are being reassigned."
They don't often reclassify before the annual review, but he knew he was now officially an I9. He wondered how bad digging ditches really was. The weather was getting nicer so maybe an outdoor job would be a nice change. Time to join the chain gang.
User Reviews
Submitted by smokymtcsw (user info) at 2004-03-16 13:54:47 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
This was excellent. The foreshadowing of the creative writing bit led me to guess that he would argue that his posting had been fiction. It would be a nice try for someone of his intelligence to avert the disaster of reclassification. I liked the story very much, something more about how none of them could have weapons, or the gulag like existence for rumored political subversives would be interesting. You can go right into it from his recognition that he might be viewed as one, before the men come in. Also it is always fun for sci fi geeks to imagine the shower a little more vividly, like describing some futuristic way in which is operates. I liked the description of the housing, it sounded like a cell that opened into a metro. Great stuff.
Submitted by Heimdallsman (user info) at 2004-03-16 13:10:35 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
I know what you mean on the reviewing comments. I tend to write the same kind of stuff. Recognition comes slowly around here, especially if you don't post every day.
Still, if you write a lot of reviews, your work will eventually attract a following.
And hell, you can spell and make paragraphs, so you're already better than 75% of the people here.
--HeimdallsMan
Submitted by Bob_Bank (user info) at 2004-03-16 12:47:00 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
cool story.
Submitted by Domochevsky (user info) at 2004-03-16 12:42:27 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
The Psychology reference in the title is worth the +2 alone. Very well done.
Submitted by rbdweasel (user info) at 2004-03-16 12:39:43 EST (#)
Ranking: 0
Thanks for the review Heimdallsman. My biggest worry is that I was not clear about the corporate rating system early on. And I agree that it could be a start of a longer piece. I just thought of it yesterday morning and was messing around with the idea. As for why nobody reviews it, it is not surprising for the following reasons:
1. It's a little longer than optimal for Uber.
2. It is a semi-serious piece and non controversial so it's not really fun to comment on.
3. I have only been posting for about a week and many users only read posts from their favorites.
Even so, I would very much appreciate feedback from anyone willing to spend the time to read and review. (And please don't interpret the above as a criticism of Uber. I think it's an excellent site.)
Submitted by Deisangua (user info) at 2004-03-16 12:39:21 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
This feels like it comes from a mix of several inspirations, but you've put it together very well.
Submitted by Heimdallsman (user info) at 2004-03-16 12:30:00 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
How come nobody's reviewing this?
Well written, but it ended rather abruptly. It would be nice to see this fleshed out, maybe serialized. Maybe we could see this class system you have going from other perspectives. It's a clever idea.
--HeimdallsMan