If the Upstairs Team got wind of this, he'd be preceding the Beater out the door. Not just out the door but probably into court-it wouldn't be the first time a company successfully sued an employee who faked a job by automating it. His panic lessened slightly when he saw there was still a handful of items in the review queue, a few short commercial spots, and a couple of videos, both Visual Mark's.
A moment later his heart went into turbo-charged overdrive again. Even automated, it should not have happened. He had to call an item out of the review queue, review it-screen it -and then dispose of it, either letting the program release it automatically, or releasing it himself. And even then the process was not self-perpetuating-he had to order it to deliver another item from the review queue. It should not have been able to continue by itself. But then, it should not have been able to start-
His heart was banging as if it were trying to bludgeon its way out of his chest. That little bastard in the penthouse. The son of a bitch had not only hacked him but infected him with some kind of virus. Had to be. If the little shit had been able to worm his way into Ludovic's area, then he could get in anywhere, and he'd just fucked around with the program until he'd kicked it into motion. And then planted his little virus. Obviously the dosage in his food was no longer strong enough-if the Upstairs Team found out-
Anxiety attack, he thought, left mesial temporal lobe. Travis would probably enjoy studying this. Especially now.
He leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes, forcing himself to breathe normally through the pain in his chest. Bad day, he repeated over and over to himself like a mantra. Bad day, bad day, badday, badday, badday…
Eventually the pain began to recede, giving ground by the slow half inch. He was almost back to normal when the pounding on the door started.
"Rivera, you motherfucker, I know you're in there!"
He groaned. Aiesi. The only person in the world who would ignore a Sealed for Privacy notice. He thumbed the speaker pad.
"This had better be important. I'm too busy to be at the beck and call of every employee with a problem."
She pounded on the door again, and he unsealed. Under normal circumstances he'd have just called security and let them deal with her. But then she might have just jumped off the terrace again.
She strode in, planted her fists on his desk, and leaned into his face. "You're gonna be too busy to live if you don't do something about Mark. He's fucked."
He gave her his standard antiprofanity wince to remind her of what an animal he thought she was. "Your friend is doing fine, according to all the reports. He's producing well above what we expected, and he's adapted beautifully, the doctors say-"
"Yah, your fuckin' butchers on your payroll. They'd certify a chuck roast if you told them to. You pull in a cold one, or I will."
"Pardon?" he said politely. "A 'cold one'?"
She straightened up and put her big fists on her hips. "A neurosurgeon from the outside. Someone who ain't in on it, who ain't standing around waiting to profit on the big fucking breakthrough."
Manny gave a short, refined laugh. "I'm afraid Diversifications' insurance plan doesn't cover consultations outside our own staff except in the case of grave emergencies needing a particular kind of specialist."
"Bill me."
"You don't have that kind of credit. Ms. Aiesi. I think you'd do better to spend some extra time on-line yourself, to get a better feel of how the system works. Your output, to be frank, hasn't been as high as we'd hoped." He actually had no idea of what her output was, but it was a good standard speech for heading off troublesome employees at the pass.
"Don't output me, I've had enough of your horseshit. You won't get a cold one in here, I'll fucking do it."
"No, you won't," he said cordially. "No doctor will examine another doctor's patient unless the patient him- or herself requests it. I don't think Mark is going to do that."
She glared at him. "I'll find a way. I will fucking find a way, and then I'm gonna nail your ass up in court-you, and your head-drillers, and this whole fucking shithole."
"I see." Manny sat forward and folded his hands on his desk. "Are you through now? Because if you are, I'd like to point some things out to you. Generally this is not how we address our superiors here. If you do it again, you'll be subject to discipline. Your whole outburst makes you subject to discipline, but I'm going to let it go because you're obviously overwrought for some reason-"
"Wow. The quality of mercy just ain't fucking strained with you, is it?" She looked at him incredulously. "Thanks for the big fucking break, I'd just hate to see this on my permanent fucking record, that just makes my shit run loose." She turned and marched out.
The door resealed behind her, and Manny waited tensely for the phone to buzz with a new crisis. It would be only too appropriate. After a few minutes of blessed quiet, he let himself relax. Apparently it was over for the day, over for the bad day. And all bad days always came to an end.
He called up a list of the released material and prepared to skim through each item, in case the Upstairs Team decided to pop-quiz him on it. If they did, he'd just tell them he'd reviewed most of the stuff prior to getting his sockets and sent it to release sequentially so as not to overload the area. None of them had the expertise to prove otherwise. Then he could screen what was left in the review queue, either later today or early tomorrow. For now, though, he would leave it frozen.
He skimmed the commercials first and found nothing that made him wince unduly. There were a few things he'd have sent back for a little fixing, but no disasters he'd have to live down or explain in full.
For the videos he went to the high-res thirty-six-inch screen in the wall behind him. The first one he tossed up was one of Aiesi's, something with a group called Canadaytime. He shook his head at the silly name. Diversifications was going to sound like it was putting out word salad. After a few minutes he used the remote to cut it off and go on to the next one.
Sometime later he became aware that he was staring at a blank screen. Dazed, he swiveled around to his desk to do something and realized he had no idea what he was going to do. He glanced at the desktop monitor. Play completed, said the plain white letters, and underneath, Actions Menu: replay, next, exit?
He turned and looked at the big screen again, frowning. His head felt foggy, as if he'd dozed off. It must have been one hell of a boring series of rock videos if it had put him to sleep.
Manny tried to remember what he'd seen, but the only thing that came to mind were vague shapes moving rhythmically. More tired than he'd realized, he thought, too much the first day back.
Abruptly he found himself standing up behind his desk, rubbing one eye to the point of soreness. Damn, but he needed a rest already, from obnoxious rock'n'roll animals and a certain hacker who was too smart for his own good.
Which reminded him-what was he going to do about that little bastard? He could go up and confront him and see where that would lead, or he could let him stew for a couple of days, worrying about what would happen, maybe let him get confident enough so that he cracked in again, but this time to a hot reception, Manny catching him in the act. And then see where that would lead. Threatening to revoke the reparation contract and having him remanded to prison could make him compliant.