Chapter 7
Director Zoey
Air hissed from the door as if it was releasing enormous pressure-unchecked. Light shone on the side of the frame and it climbed to Reil’s chest, where it found sleep. Vein-like, it moved through the inside of the door in visibility and something whirred to life, tho there wasn’t much grinding or clanking at all.
It was smooth… perfect. The moment it stopped moving was the moment when a handle cogged out of that lit-up surface and took a specific shape of appropriateness for the two men.
Both men looked at each other for reassurance that this was finally happening and Reil gestured with his hand for Tristan to proceed.
Defiance shook itself, yet Reil was stern in his decisiveness, and Tristan gulped down his remaining irresolution from the lack of choice.
His steps moved him closer, his hand grabbed the slick and shiny metal, and with an audible exhale, Tristan pressed downwards. There was no visible strain in the motion that Reil’s eyes could register into scrutiny, while the massive door opened inwards so fluidly, as if it were alive and helping out the suited man.
Something caught Reil’s eyes in the corner of the wooden walls, it glinted in reflection as if it had moved its slick surface. It wasn’t a protrusion but it looked and appeared to have the small shape of an… eye… He wanted to test his assumption and took two steps back, and the reflection disappeared, while that eye moved, which pulled out a snort, as he had just realized they were being watched.
Guess the whole place was wired and secured. It reeked of uptightness and control, despite the lack of forth in the scheduling and meetings, apparently.
Reil’s looked at the chamber office, and saw the minimal brown floor-uneven, as if dug into the tree itself, yet when Tristan stepped onto it, it was like he was in the air, and the surprise reached Reil, where he questioned if reality was being twisted-foul.
The young man hesitantly put his other leg there and tapped with his shoe upon the surface. But the door kept on opening and thus revealed the office which consisted of a large window in the end, while cupboards and many monitors riddled the natural walls around.
With that came a heavy voice from the end of the room which was given a face as they entered without a warm invitation-present. The people there were a woman, likely the Director, who was sitting behind her wide, black desk, with clasped hands in front, and an oceanic-coated man with a black sweater who was leaning close to her.
“I want it all sent by the end of this damn week. Get it into your head once and for all, or e—…”
The man held his tongue in an instant and shot a glare at Reil and Tristan, which got them both to freeze at the entrance of the room and to just stay like that for a while, until the man spat with detest, “You interns lost or what? Get ou—”
“That’s my business, Sir. Don’t meddle,” the Director fatally interjected with stern confidence at the man who was caught out of words as he glanced around the new arrivals and, with the new information for Reil, subordinate.
“Relations with interns, no wonder why you’re stalling to report. Get your erroneous decadence in regulation or someone more competent will assimilate your undeserved position,” the man aggressively put forth and dropped documents onto the wooden desk that was part of the floor itself. Yet, it was refined around the edges in great care and craftsmanship, or was that just an illusion due to the desk being of color that lacked similarity with the tree itself? The Director only kept her stern gaze without even peeling a word, to which her superior huffed darkly and began exiting the luxurious office.
The new arrivals moved out of the way, as the man was just drilling spite at them, with the visible want for an excuse to start a problem, which Reil didn’t even want to instigate with someone above the individual with whom they were supposed to make a deal. Only a madman would put their head in the hornet’s nest.
The heavy scent of perfume, mingled with earthy mud, got to Reil’s nose as the older man passed by them with an inhospitable grunt. It was the last thing articulated before the heavy door closed with the air of pressure sealing them in from the world outside.
That exact moment, the Director’s arms went underneath the desk and did something with lackless vision, while the two young men just stood there. Reil couldn’t believe the bad timing they had come to because the person behind that seat of power, even with the gentle lines of her face, she was just furious.
Her neck was smooth and bright, with a tattoo nestled in the middle and reaching for her chest, where parts of a hood could be barely perceived on her skin, between the opened buttons of her white, sleeveless shirt.
Just then a half-full liquor bottle was pulled out, clanking on top the desk with a quick addition of fancy drinking glasses. It was as if she was in her own world and wasn’t giving them any kind of thought as all her attention poured itself in the indecisiveness of the next steps.
Grabbing the bottle with a swing, she poured a lot of liquor in her glass. But then she did something even crazier as the contents were taken in a single shot with pain on her face, her fingers trailing through her short-brown hair.
Everstill, no words, no body language giving Reil the signal… total and eerie nothingness. They were fully ignored.
Yet… there were two more glasses on her expensive desk. Maybe that was the hint that Reil needed to see? He touched Tristan’s shoulder and gestured with his head to move. Reil just realized the floor was made from glass as the surface was slick like butter. But there was no time to contemplate on curiosity, and they confidently closed the distance, taking a seat from next to the wall.
The big glass window behind the Director was giving view to the vastness of the Amazonia and even distant tints of the Wildlands… what a view… what privilege… what luck!
Reil took lead as he knew that Tristan wasn’t going to be able to figure anything out in this dire and fragile situation.
“Almost late, was very rainy today, e-heh,” Reil began with his smug voice, while closing to the side of the desk, since a frontal position with anybody wasn’t a good idea, unless you were to try and intimidate or judge them. To his attempt the answer was nothing as the Director just made another trail in her hair.
“We didn’t want to intrude but I believe that you’re a director who doesn’t tolerate slackers…” He put his chair close to the end of the side of the desk and motioned to Tristan to do so close to him. Thus they sat. “Especially nosey, bosses.”
The Director stopped twisting the emptiness in her hand and slowly angled her head at Reil, who caught her oceanic eyes. They spoke of great aggravation and silent rage, which got him to defensively smirk and gulp internally to the woman before him.
She pried her red leathery chair towards them and Reil noticed her tight, gray skirt that was just slightly above her elegant knees, yet her feet were bare with fingers turning up and down.
That was odd…
Just then she poured more alcohol into her greedy hands, but this time it was twice as less, which meant that her stress was going away. That meant that his words were working, he needed to stray her away from the gloom and into an idea of potentialities.
“Guess it’s unnecessary for long introductions as you surely know who we are, Zoey,” he calculatingly dared and saw the despair in Tristan. Her hand had frozen, giving off a small gap to notice the lack of long nails or even polish as they looked as dull as his own, while what looked like tattoos of rope snaked around her bare arms and under her shirt.
He had heard it countless times that he should never put anything on his body as companies would never want to hire him, at least those old at Larrylon would say so…
Oh how ignorant and primitive they were to think they knew any better of how the world worked… oh how he was so glad to have found that only he could pave his way to success by trusting in himself rather than the nonsense of those losers.
He had broken the formal barrier without asking or having been allowed permission, something that always gave him that attention. Of course right now it was as risky as it could get.
After all, the first step to getting someone to trust you is by getting close to that individual, thus using their first name or even giving them another one, which in this situation could either benefit their cause or entirely disintegrate it.
But Zoey’s stuckness in time faded as she just continued with her drink as if nothing had happened, thus Reil stopped rubbing his shoes together.
“I’m Reil, and this is Tristan. You can call me however you’d like. Him? Would you mind if so?” Reil asked Tristan, who for a moment was utterly dumbfounded.
“Uh— no-no! No issues there,” Tristan burst out accidentally, to which Reil internally tried to shoot himself in the head.
But Zoey wasn’t reacting badly, her eyes were actually roaming his friend and she raised her chin up with her finger stroking the bright skin underneath, as if she was thinking about something Reil couldn’t predict.
The inferno in her azures had reduced tho, and her face had significantly softened. He gave the credit to his smoothness but it all could’ve been the alcohol, which’s strong smell he could easily catch in the air of the cozy office. Her fingers trailed towards her chest and stopped on top the inky hood.
“We come as representatives of our company to negotiate a deal! I see the time isn’t that ideal, but hold belief that we can skirt around the issue and reach a mutual understanding that’d lead to great opportunities,” Reil festively explained with great emotion and articulation from his body, but the only thing Zoey did was breathe and stare. No words, no body expression, nothing. Was she testing them if they’d run out of things to say? Did she know who she was dealing with?
“It may not appear so at first but we must look into the future and hold the greater picture in light, rather than the quick and easy ways that’d be just temporary and lacking strength to survive time itself,” Reil continued and even stood up from his spot, which got Zoey to slowly move with the position of his body that paced slowly into the space behind the desk and towards the big window.
“We may be talking about putting five floors today, but tomorrow it’ll be ten, then twenty. After a month: a thousand!” Reil neared closer to the thick, spotless glass from where he just stood in wonder to the magnificence before him.
“All it takes is a seed to be planted, and if nurtured, it’ll grow into a fine and fruitful tree of magnificence!” His feet carried him around the other side where he looked around books of law and economy and psychology, while pictures were lacking as if they were avoided like the black plague.
“I know what you’re doing, Zoey. But I guess you just listening is enough, wouldn’t you agree?” he asked as he glanced over his shoulder. He could clearly see annoyance around Zoey’s mouth, yet she remained silent as a stone and poured again in her now-filling glass. The gesture was taken as a positive greenlight.
“Of course you would, long live consistency, eh?” He moved in front the desk and trailed one of his fingers over the smooth wood. It was so damn nice. His motions were indeed taken in with attention by Zoey, yet some subtle hints of curiosity were forming around her manners. Reil knew he was getting close to it, so of course he was going to rush full speed ahead.
“So how about we talk about it? Reach a common ground where everyone will be happy. Well, not that guard outside, I don’t think he’d even understand the word…” Reil tried to joke around as he put both his hands on the back of Tristan, who initially flinched but relaxed under the tapping fingers against his coat. Reil could swear he saw a tug on Zoey’s lips that resembled a smile but then it all fell, as she frowned deeply and put both her bare feet onto the desk, in one fluid motion which almost toppled the bottle of liquor.
Her hand reached for something on the desk and the room instantly turned black, the only sources of light being the window and monitors around the walls, while the floor, walls and ceiling were empty pits of nothing.
The furniture was as if levitating with lack of hesitance in the air. It got Reil’s lungs to electrify and his stomach to develop the sensation of falling, yet he tried to smash the nervousness by just sitting, tho he was very excited to understand how this had even occurred within this office of wonders and advancement.
“Am I supposed to trust the word of… interns? You can be anybody, I don’t think you even know how to dress properly… doing business to and fro, hah” Zoey’s voice became known. It was gentle and malicious, just the right amount of malicious to prick a nerve on Reil’s expectations.
So this was it, heh? She had heard what she wanted and enjoyed the distraction he had given her, and now she was going to lay her anger and hate at them instead of her boss who deserved every last bit. Maybe he could steer the conversation there somehow, maybe he could beat her in the game of words, now that she had entered it with a rather nasty attitude.
“Am I supposed to trust a tipsy director?” he shot back, to which she instantly snorted into her drink and actually giggled in a cute manner, but didn’t respond verbally, just gazed into Reil again, but this time with… amusement?
He stood up and leaned closer to her, his weight resting on his hands that propped on the desk, despite the ill feeling derived from the aura of darkness. “I think we know how to dress pretty well,” he gestured at her bare feet, then tugging the unbuttoned space of his shirt and trailing his fingers down slowly, to which her eyes followed intently. “Just a matter of perspective.”
Zoey stood between perplexity and awe, and he knew that he had struck a nerve, as she played with her fingers until words accompanied her actions, “Truly, such a delicate matter… Seen by few, understood by less…” she trailed off as her feet rubbed together, and Reil really wanted to ask why she was under-dressed, but forced himself not to.
“Which leads us to that special conundrum that we’ve come to work upon, by those, who understand,” Tristan suddenly piped out of nowhere, a decision that reft Reil’s heart at first. But the words that had come in the tone that had followed, they were rather flamboyant.
Reil noticed the squint of her eyes at Tristan, and after she licked her surely drying lips, her legs were removed from her desk, which showed the end of her superciliousness to mock and torture them. So to that, Reil took his rightful seat and clasped his fingers in patience for Zoey’s words to come.
But words didn’t come, as she grabbed the other two empty glasses and filled them with abnormal amounts of the sharp poison, while giving herself even loftily more. Reil’s mind saw possibilities with bad tastes and regressive actions. Without standing up, she pushed the crystal shapes towards the two men as best she could, slightly failing, which showed that the effects of intoxication were getting to her. That meant well tho, she was going to ease up and Reil could take control over the situation. They just had to keep talking.
“Sorry, but we’ll pass,” Reil asserted calmly and tugged her a fake smile that she visibly took with bitterness.
“Drink… then maybe we talk,” she happily concluded and raised her drink ready for them to clank together and gulp down the surplus contents, but Reil didn’t want to do so and his warmth fell into the depths of his most distant, hateful memory-downtrodden.
“It’s not necc—”
“I decide that,” she interjected with fatality and unwavering relentlessness that chilled the bones of his body. He didn’t know what to say. She wasn’t allowing him to talk his way out of this, and she evidently knew what she wanted and that was why she was demanding for them to continue.
This woman wasn’t stupid; she was currently in full control and was abusing her position of getting what she desired. If he wasn’t on the receiving end, he would’ve laughed so hard that his throat would’ve dried out like an incandescent desert.
He looked at Tristan with guilt and pursed his lips, to which the young man gulped surreptitiously and nodded in regret. Reil reached for the glass of bad choices and raised it up, with Tristan doing the same after some moments-unconfident. Zoey beamed in satisfaction all the way and moved her hand towards them that resulted in a loud clank with some of the contents spilling on their hands and desk. Warmth spread on Reil’s skin, as they withdrew the contents of blight and contrition.
Reil took it closer to his nose and sniffed deeply. There was an immediate reaction with an immediate effect on his nasal cavity that couldn’t resist to try and stop the foulness as mucus appeared. He believed to be already in the realm of intoxication due to the fumes that lived within this… scent? More like miasma. But time, time’s winds were sailing fast.
“Bottoms up, internies,” Zoey coyly simpered through a short laugh and killed her glass easily, but this time with an expected grunt. Reil gulped hard and tried to think about something else as he put the cold glass to his mouth. But as nothing was managing to psychologically infuse the stress with joy, he just poured all the contents inside his mouth without thought.
The burning hotness coated his tongue in near escape, but him forcing it shut got it to streak to the base of his throat. Gagging came and went, while he tried to get himself proper.
This was some damn strong stuff, but he needed to get it down so they could have more time with her. More time meant a possible chance to chip through the wall she was effortlessly holding between them. The more it stood inside him, the less he would be able to savor food in the future.
