Chapter 3
1185 Words
I replied, "No."
By six that evening, it was time to clock out.
The evening air in Newston felt cool against my skin as I walked out of the building.
A black Maybach was parked by the curb.
The window rolled down. Lucas sat behind the wheel, with one hand resting on it. Every strand of his hair was slicked back with expensive wax.
In the passenger seat, Eve was touching up her lipstick.
She was wearing a black swan velvet couture gown.
My couture gown.
The dress was made for a very specific figure, and Eve clearly didn't have it.
The waist was too tight, and the zipper in the back had only made it halfway up. She had thrown a cheap synthetic shawl over it, trying to hide the mess.
"Oh, you're off work?" she said, tugging at the shawl.
Then she pinched her nose and waved her hand in front of her face. "I can smell that disinfectant on you from three blocks away. Stay away from the car. Don't stink up the leather."
Lucas tapped the steering wheel and didn't even bother looking at me.
He urged, "Stop wasting time on her. Mrs. Emily Collins is coming in tomorrow for a custom anti-aging treatment. That's the real money. We're going out to celebrate. Roll up the window."
Even sitting in the front seat of a Maybach, Eve still couldn't hide that cheap winner's grin.
I stood by the curb and raised my hand, giving them a small wave.
At the same time, my thumb pressed the side button on my phone and confirmed the countdown command that would disconnect the machines from the network.
"Enjoy your dinner," I said.
The Maybach's taillights soon disappeared into rush-hour traffic, leaving nothing behind but exhaust.
Tomorrow, Emily's face would be worth a whole lot more than their little celebration.
For the next three days, I clocked in on time.
I played the role of a janitor perfectly.
Every day, I wore the same cheap, rough gray uniform and wandered through the lobby with a plastic bucket in hand.
I cleaned the floor-to-ceiling glass on the first floor until it shone.
The glass was so clear that it reflected everything happening upstairs.
And from there, I got a front-row seat to the circus on the second floor.
Eve had completely let herself go.
She ordered three custom silk white coats, all cut tight to show off her waist. She left the collar open on purpose, with a limited-edition Van Cleef necklace sitting at her throat.
She even hired a filming crew to follow her around all day.
Cameras, lights, and microphones never left her. She tried hard to play the role of a genius beauty director online.
In every video, she tossed around flashy terms like "next-level anti-aging" and "gene-level repair".
The funny part was, she couldn't even explain the basics of a cell cycle.
With my VIP schedule in her hands, she really thought those old-money wives were puppets waiting for her call.
She thought a couple of sweet texts would be enough to make them show up and pay.
That didn't last long.
At two in the afternoon on the third day, a sharp electronic alarm started screaming from the second floor.
A moment later, the first-floor restroom door was kicked open.
Lucas stormed in without his suit jacket.
His tie hung crooked over one shoulder, and his face was twisted with rage.
He rushed straight at me and snatched the toilet brush out of my hand.
He snapped, "What the hell did you do to the transfer system?"
His voice cracked as he shouted, "Three Time Reversal machines worth over ten million each crashed at the same time!"
I took a step back and pointed at the employee policy that had just been posted on the wall.
I said, "Dr. Prescott, maybe you should read the memo you signed yesterday.
"Janitorial staff are strictly prohibited from entering the second-floor VIP treatment area or handling any medical equipment. Violations will result in disciplinary action."
Then I spread my hands. "I haven't even set foot on the second floor. How exactly did I sabotage anything?"
Lucas froze. His mouth opened, then closed again.
For several seconds, he couldn't come up with a single response.
Before he could try, hurried footsteps echoed through the hallway.
Eve ran into the room with a tablet. "Lucas, forget about her! Mrs. Collins' convoy is already two blocks away. She'll be here in ten minutes!"
Then she turned to me. The arrogance was still there, but now there was a hint of desperation underneath it.
"Serena, you memorized Mrs. Collins' treatment settings, right? Just give us the numbers. If you help out, I'll make sure you don't have to clean the women's restroom today. Maybe I can even move you up to nurse assistant."
How generous. I almost laughed.
"Left side energy output at 35. Right side at 40. Lowest setting around the eyes."
The numbers came out instantly. I didn't even need to think.
Eve's eyes lit up. She started hammering notes into the tablet as fast as her fingers could move.
"Oh, and one more thing." I grabbed a cleaning rag from the sink and slowly dried my hands.
"Mrs. Collins is insanely picky. During treatment, she only drinks hand-poured Geisha coffee.
"The water has to be exactly 85 degrees. Miss by even one degree, and she'll throw a fit."
"Did you get all that?" Lucas asked.
He let out a long breath of relief and grabbed Eve by the arm. "Go get the machines ready. If we screw up a client worth this much money, we're all dead."
The two of them rushed toward the door.
Just before leaving, Lucas pointed at me. "And don't get any ideas. Helping out once doesn't buy you anything. Finish cleaning."
A second later, they disappeared around the corner.
I leaned against the cold marble wall and peeled off my cheap rubber gloves. Then I tossed them into the medical waste bin.
Those two idiots really thought a multimillion-dollar medical platform worked like a kitchen appliance.
As if typing in a few numbers was enough to make everything run.
The three flagship machines weren't built that way. Their entire security system ran through a protected Zebrilynss server network.
The cloud authorization keys were tied directly to my fingerprint.
Without the required permissions, the machines automatically activated their own security protocols.
Anyone trying to force the system would only trigger a hardware shutdown.
Keep pushing, and the main boards would burn out.
At that point, the machines would be nothing more than very expensive piles of scrap metal.
I slipped a hand into my work uniform pocket and pulled out my backup phone.
After entering a thirteen-digit administrator code, I opened the internal control system.
The equipment dashboard appeared on the screen.
I disconnected the gateway, blocked the local verification ports, and cleared the device whitelist cache.
A few seconds later, the process was complete.
I locked the screen and slid the phone back into my pocket.
'Enjoy the feast, Lucas.'
- Writer
