/// WAKE

DECEMBER 10

2042

?08:00 /// ☀ 68° F /// ????

The sun rises over New Saipan.

The halls are bathed in an orange glow.

The only sound interrupting the subtle hum of appliances and electronics is the rhythmic tapping of high heels on the linoleum floor.

Approaching the elevator at the end of the hall, she taps her ID card on the sensor, and boards to ascend to the 105th floor. 

Half a minute later, the doors open to the receptionist’s desk in front of the office she’d been instructed to report to first thing in the morning. The receptionist glances up from her desktop, silently acknowledging her entrance. 

RECEPTIONIST

Your name, ma’am?

EMPLOYEE

Hi, yes, it’s Angelica. Angelica S-

RECEPTIONIST

Soco. Yes, you’re on here, just- just sit down and he’ll be with you shortly.

EMPLOYEE

..Soco. Yeah. Thanks.

Seven minutes and twelve seconds pass.

Angelica had been tracking the time on her smartwatch. She’s always been a meticulous timekeeper, timing every possible element of her life. She does this not out of obsessive compulsion, but of the simple pleasure of logging data and keeping track of things. 

As a child, Angelica would glance at the clocks in her classroom constantly, observing how long each assignment took to complete, how long the morning announcements were that day, or how long the teacher took to finish ranting about his ongoing divorce.

As a teenager, she’d track how long it took for her high school boyfriend to notice her new haircut, how many minutes it took for her iced coffee to be prepared, and how long her first driver license test took. 

The driver license test actually only lasted fifty-seven seconds, as she ran over a pylon while parallel parking and was disqualified immediately. 

One of the few things she never timed was how long she spent reading a file she discovered yesterday evening as she was on her way out of the office.
The contents were in perfectly legible English, yet they seemed cryptic to her, and the recurring subject matter was some bizarre, ultra-powerful machine with an equally bizarre name.

Reading about it made her chuckle.

 Beta-Reality Gird Rig, abbreviated as BRGR. Looks like “burger”. 

That thought, along with thoughts and questions pertaining to all the other data she had discovered in the file have been occupying her mind ever since. 

RECEPTIONIST

Mrs. Soco? 

Angelica’s head and eyes perk up.

RECEPTIONIST

Mr. Richards will see you now.

Angelica stands up and heads around the receptionist’s desk to the door of the office. The door was slightly larger than most others in the building, and it was made of polished wood as opposed to grayish-blue metal or solid glass like the rest. 

There was a gold plaque on the door.

   ANGELICA (TO HERSELF)

 ..Huh.

She nervously knocked on the door.

        ALLEN RICHARDS
Come in. 

She enters the opulently decorated office.

As she steps in, her mind runs through a few potential situations or reasons as to why she was asked to meet with Richards in the first place, given she has no kind of administrative or high-ranking position, nor does she have any connection with anyone who does.

  ALLEN RICHARDS
    Hello.

Angelica reaches out to shake his hand, to which he extends his own. To her slight shock, he has a somewhat limp handshake. 

ANGELICA

Mr. Richards! Soco, uh, Angelica So-

     ALLEN RICHARDS
      Soco, yes, yes, I know you. Please sit.
    ANGELICA
    ..Well, it’s nice to meet you, sir.
    ALLEN RICHARDS
      Mhm.

Richards unfolds a tablet and types something onto it, turning it around to show Angelica the screen.

    ALLEN RICHARDS
    You've seen this. What is it?

Angelica’s heart sinks. She has, in fact, seen the documents shown on the tablet. Ever since around five o’clock yesterday, she’d been stuck with a lingering feeling that she’d seen something she shouldn’t have. 

ANGELICA

I.. don’t really understand.

ALLEN RICHARDS
      The question is plain and simple. What is there      

not to understand?

ANGELICA

No, I mean, I.. I understand the question. I just don’t exactly understand what was in there.

The file never really made sense to me. I spent hours last night just trying to put those pieces togethe-

ALLEN RICHARDS
      Save it. 

Did you plan to share this document with anyone?

ANGELICA

No.. nobody.

Angelica’s heart is beating out of her chest.

Her mind rushes through several possible situations once again. What if this ends up coming at the cost of her career?
Or worse, what if she ends up with some kind of industrial espionage charge?
Worry consumes her mind before Richards speaks again.

ALLEN RICHARDS
      Very well, then. You’re dismissed.

He makes a subtle hand gesture in the door’s direction.

Angelica, with a look of both surprise and relief in her eyes, stands up and attempts to push in the plush leather chair. The chair, with one of its wheel locks still engaged, shudders and skids awkwardly as Richards briefly stares at her in silence, bearing a mildly amused expression before opening his desk drawer, seemingly reaching for something.

Angelica releases the stuck wheel lock with her foot and finally pushes the chair all the way in.

She turns around, approaches the door, and grabs the handle.
The door doesn’t budge.

The click of a pistol’s hammer is heard behind her. 

\\\