No Facilities

Today’s Thursday Doors Recap includes the entries posted on May 15th and this past Thursday.

At ths point, with just under a week to go in the Thursday Doors Writing Challenge, there are 52 creative entries. The story below will be story No. 53. My story is inspired by a door from Miriam Hurdle at The Showers of Blessings.

Payback

John Woodrow swiped his card to open the gate and then pulled into his favorite parking place in the small lot across from the office. He pulled through one spot, so he’d be able to drive straight out when it was time to go home. He sighed deeply when he noticed the light behind the main entrance. The security guard wouldn’t be on duty until 6:30, so someone else was already in the office. He hoped it wasn’t one of the knuckleheads in his department.

He took the stairs up to the third floor of the historic building. This had been the City Hall until the city outgrew it. As he emerged from the stairwell, he saw a band of light on the floor in front of the door to his department.

“So much for enjoying my quiet time.”

All the lights were on in the office area. As he walked toward his office, he heard someone rustling behind him. As he was opening his door, he turned to see one of his programmers.

“Good morning, Seth. Come in early to clean out your desk? I hate to tell you but the folks in HR won’t be here until nine.”

“No, it seems I won’t be cleaning out my desk today. That’s why I’m here, Mr. Woodrow, I need your help.”

“Seth, for the thousandth time, call me John. Now relax. I’m curious, I’m interested, and I’m willing to help, but not before I get a cup of coffee. Go in and sit down. I’ll be right there.”

“I made a fresh pot.”

“Thanks.”

“What the hell could be so important. The kid resigned yesterday. I wonder if he’s having second thoughts. Oh well…soon enough.”

John walked in and mostly shut the door behind him. He sat across from Seth McVee at the small conference table.

“Okay, Seth. What has your shorts in a twist at this ungodly hour? Are you having second thoughts?”

“No. Nothing like that, nothing at all. Last night, as I was getting ready to leave, Mr. Monroe called me into his office.”

John started shaking his head. Larry Monroe was in charge of the division, and whenever he deigned to meet with any of John’s staff, it never ended well.

“What did Larry want to see you about?”

“He’s not letting me leave.”

“What? You’re not in prison, Seth. He can’t stop you from resigning.”

“Not that. You know my wife and I are moving to West Virginia. She’s already down there. She started her nursing job last weekend. I’m supposed to get everything cleaned out and packed. The movers are coming Friday. If we’re not out of the apartment before Sunday, we’ll owe another month’s rent. I can’t afford that.”

“I’m not following you, Seth. What does this have to do with Larry?”

“When I resigned, you told me that you’d give me two week’s pay. I think you said ‘in lieu of notice’ or something like that.”

John nodded. “Correct, but I’m not giving it to you, it’s company policy. That’s a security protocol in place for all programmers and anyone in Accounting.”

“Well, Mr. Monroe cancelled that. He says I have to finish the upgrade to the system I’m working on.”

“His project management system.”

“Yes, PrimStat – Project Improvement Status and Tracking. All the programmers call it , and him for that matter, PissAnt.”

John laughed and then grabbed his forehead and sighed.

“Look, Seth. I’ll talk to Larry when he gets in. How much work is left on that piece of…that system.”

“About five days’ worth. I could finish it before the weekend, if I worked late every night, but I’d never get my stuff packed, and I can’t reschedule the movers. This isn’t fair. Jonesy resigned three months ago, and he got the two week’s pay deal.”

“I know. I’ll remind Larry of that, and I’ll speak with HR. Can anyone else finish this upgrade?”

“I could bring Bobby up to speed. I’d be willing to stay today and do that.”

“Okay. That’s good. Sit tight. I’ll jump on this as soon as the rest of this place wakes up.”

“Thanks Mr. Woodrow.”

“John, Seth. Please, call me John.”

Larry Monroe was a person to whom power should never have been given. Nothing and no one in his mind rose to the level of importance as himself and his petty needs. He thought nothing of inconveniencing everyone if it worked to his benefit. The project management system was the electronic thumb under which he kept pressure on everyone without actually having to dirty his mind with any understanding of actual work. The update Seth was working on would extend that system into every nook and cranny of activity and enable over 50 alerts Larry could react to. Once operational, he would shower the department with electronic nag-notes. John guessed that his senior programmers would likely leave within a few months.

─●─●─●─

Larry strolled into the office at 9:05, pulling a roll-aboard briefcase and carrying a large coffee. John normally avoided Larry, but today he followed him into his office.

“John, I have to get ready for the CEO’s staff meeting this afternoon. I’m afraid whatever you have must wait until tomorrow.”

“No! What I have can’t wait, Larry. You need to change your mind about this system and let Seth go with two weeks pay in lieu of notice.”

“Can’t do that, John. PrimStat is too important. I need it online ASAP.”

“Larry, you can’t ignore company policy. We put this in place at the request of the auditors and the Audit Committee of the Board.”

“Screw company policy—it’s a stupid policy anyway—I need those updates. Seth stays. If he leaves today, he leaves without pay and without my, or your recommendation.”

“What’s that tired expression, is this the hill I want to die on? No, no it’s not.”

John visited the head of Human Resources. Barret O’Conner explained that company policy could only be ignored in the case of mission critical work, but that the decision as to what was mission critical rested with Larry. As John walked back to his office, he tapped Seth on the shoulder and asked him to join him.

“Seth, Larry is being recalcitrant, and he has stretched the understanding of policy to support his idiotic decision. You’re going to have to finish that update, or the company will withhold your final check.”

“What’s the difference? If I can’t move, I’ll have to give most of that check to my landlord.”

“Larry has a meeting at the main office this afternoon. Leave here after lunch. Go home and pack your stuff. I’ll swing by after work and help you finish packing. You can stay at my house until the system is done.”

“You sure your wife won’t mind?”

“I’m sure. Terrie likes you and she doesn’t like Larry. I’ll ask Bobby to help you. If you can get it done this weekend, you’ll be on your way to West Virginia Monday night.”

“Okay. That works. I really appreciate this, John.”

─●─●─●─

The next few days passed quietly. Seth and Bobby finished the changes and began testing the new features. Testing the various alerts was arduous, since a test project had to be created and each unique scenario required a task to be assigned to a dummy user. Of course, data had to be crafted to trigger the alert. Larry was pleased, but that didn’t stop him from asking for a few changes. Seth and Bobby worked through lunch on Monday. The system went into production at 2:00 pm. Seth sat through HR’s brief offboarding process. At John’s request, Barret O’Conner updated Seth’s notice of resignation to Monday’s date so Seth would receive a full two weeks’ pay on top of his final check.

John, Terrie and Seth shared a final meal together Monday evening. Seth loaded the stuff that hadn’t gone in the moving van into his Kia Sportage and left for Virginia at 9:00.

─●─●─●─

Tuesday morning at 9:15, Larry yelled for John. John stepped into Larry’s office.

“What’s wrong?”

“PrimStat’s acting up. Did the new version get installed?”

“You know it did. You tested it yesterday before you signed off on Seth’s resignation. I logged into the system this morning to complete my final entry on the update, it was working fine.”

“Well, it’s not working now.”

“Did you login fresh?”

“Yes. But when I did, the screen flashed and the menu that loaded isn’t the one I tested yesterday. It’s not the previous one, either.”

John walked over to Larry’s computer. He tried a few things, then he clicked to login as a different user. He entered his own credentials, and the system refreshed and loaded as expected. A quick survey around the office revealed that the system was working fine for everyone except Larry.

“It has something to do with your credentials. I think Seth might have put a bug in here as a little bit of payback.”

“That son-of-a-bitch, I’ll stop his final check until he comes back and fixes this.”

“Too late. HR made an ACH deposit yesterday.”

Larry slammed his mouse on the credenza next to his keyboard. He turned to John.

“You tell Bobby to figure this out and fix it. Now!”

“Okay, but in the meantime, let’s give you a new UserID and log you back in.”

“No! I’m using this system as ‘L Monroe at wicksham dot com.’ It’s linked to my email, my calendar and the alerts are programmed to ping my phone if I tag them as critical. I have to be me!”

“Alright, L Monroe, we’ll get this fixed.”

“And find out how he changed this system after that final test.”

─●─●─●─

John checked with Barret O’Conner. Seth was removed from the system the previous afternoon and was escorted out of the building after being offboarded. HR was in possession of his ID/access card, his parking card and his company issued cell phone. His ID number had been removed from the security system.

John returned to his office only to find Bobby waiting for him.

“What’s up, Bobby?”

“Bad news, John. The system’s gone.”

“Gone? What the hell does that mean? I was using it this morning.”

“The production image is installed, but the source code is gone. I can’t make the changes Larry wants. I can’t make any changes.”

“Does he know that?”

“No. I’m afraid to tell him. It gets worse.”

“How’s that even possible?”

“The source code isn’t backed up anywhere.”

“That’s ridiculous. The entire library is backed up every night.”

“Yep, but PissAnt, sorry, PrimStat has been removed from the backups—every version.”

“Alright, go back to your desk and try to look like you’re working.”

John walked down to the security desk and asked Ron Semas for the phone number of whoever was on duty the previous night.

“I was on duty. Jared called in sick, so I stayed over and worked a double.”

“Do you know Seth McVee?” Ron nodded. “Did Seth come in last night after nine o’clock?”

“He did. He said he was the guy on duty, and he had received an alert. Said there was something he had to fix. He showed me something on his phone—didn’t make much sense to me, but it looked official.”

“How did he get into our offices?”

“I let him in. Poor kid said he left in such a hurry, he forgot his wallet and ID. He said you’d be checking. I guess you guys are pretty strict about showing up when on call.”

John laughed, “Yeah, Larry Monroe runs a tight ship.”

John returned to his office and met again with Bobby.

“I figured out what happened. Looks like Seth wanted to get even with Larry for making him finish that update. I don’t know how he pulled this off, though—his ID had been cancelled.”

“Mr. Monroe didn’t want to come in over the weekend. He gave us his credentials.”

“And, of course, Larry is an Admin user.”

“Yep. We were able to put the system into production with his UserID and password.

 “Okay, seems like you’ll have to recreate those changes.”

“After someone does a lot of typing.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean there’s no source code whatsoever for the system. The only thing we have is a printout of the previous version—it was locked in a fireproof cabinet. Someone has to input that before I can change anything.”

“Can’t we scan that?”

“No. It’s the markup version with color-coded highlights, connecting lines and brackets, and notations. The scanner will pick those up. It would take longer to edit that crap out than it would to re-enter it.”

“Okay. I’ll bring Larry up to date. Stay tuned.”

“Thanks for not making me tell Mr. Monroe.”

“No need to thank me, Bobby, this is going to be fun.”