Chapter 7 First Day and the Poisoned Project
634 Words
Monday morning arrived bright and early. Lila put on her new blazer, styled her hair neatly, and headed to Aetheris. Crawfish had already taken care of everything: her ID badge was waiting at the front desk, her office was fully stocked with her favorite snacks and drinks, and her computer had been optimized to run 3x faster than any other machine in the building.
[Your desk is by the window—you said you like natural light.]
[I installed all your favorite coding tools and set up your keyboard exactly how you like it.]
[The break room has your favorite matcha latte machine. I made sure they restocked it this morning.]
Lila smiled, typing back, “You’re the best. I don’t know how I’d survive without you.”
[You’d survive. But you don’t have to.]
As she walked into the AI division, all eyes turned to her. Whispers followed her down the hallway—everyone had heard about the new senior engineer who’d gotten hired straight out of grad school, who’d gotten Jake Hale expelled, who’d impressed Ethan Carter so much he’d given her her own division.
Most people were friendly, welcoming her to the team. But one man stood in the corner, staring at her with cold, angry eyes. That was Victor Hale—Jake’s uncle, and the former head of the neural interface division. He’d been demoted when Ethan created the new division for Lila, and he hated her for it.
Ethan introduced Lila to the team, gave her a quick tour of the lab, and left her to settle in. No sooner had he left than Victor marched over to her desk, slamming a thick folder down on the table.
“Welcome to Aetheris, Ms. Voss,” he said, his voice dripping with sarcasm. “Since you’re so talented, I have a little project for you. This is the smart prosthetics algorithm we’ve been working on for two years. It’s a disaster—every test has failed, and the client is threatening to pull out and sue us for $10 million.”
He leaned down, his voice low and menacing. “You have one week to fix it. If you don’t, you’re fired. And I’ll make sure you never work in tech again.”
The team fell silent, staring at Lila with sympathy. Everyone knew this project was a death trap. Three different teams had tried and failed to fix it in two years. No one could do it in a week.
Victor smirked, turning to walk away. “I’ll see you next Monday, Ms. Voss. Don’t be late with the results.”
Lila stared at the thick folder, her hands shaking with anger. She opened it, and her heart sank. The code was a mess—full of bugs, bad logic, and a broken core architecture that would take months to rewrite.
She pulled out her phone, typing to Crawfish, “He gave me the prosthetics project. The one that’s been failing for two years. He wants it done in a week. He’s trying to get me fired.”
Crawfish’s reply was instant, sharp with fury.
[That bastard. He knows this project is impossible.]
[But don’t worry. I’ve already looked at the code. It’s bad, but I can fix it.]
[Three days. I’ll have a perfect working algorithm ready in three days. We’re going to make him regret ever messing with you.]
Lila took a deep breath, closing the folder. She looked up at her team, who were watching her nervously.
“Alright, everyone,” she said, her voice steady and confident. “We have a project to finish. Let’s get to work.”
No one knew it yet, but Victor Hale had just dug his own grave. And Crawfish was going to be the one to push him in.
- Writer
