FRANK:
Of course, I know what those people upstairs say about me, that I'm a creep and a pervert. That's rich, when they're the same people who sent me down here and gave me this job to do. It's not like I volunteered for it. I didn't even know there was such a job. They told me there was a vacancy in HR, managing people, and that sounded like a step up for me. I'd been nothing more than a glorified janitor for the last ten years, whatever fancy title about building management they gave me.
I should have known something was up when they were so vague at the interview about what I'd be doing. The advert had said I'd be dealing with "difficult" employees, so at the interview I talked about providing feedback, recording negative behavior, and so on--I'd read up all about what you're supposed to do. I got some odd looks when I said all that, but they offered me the job anyway. I thought: it's a desk job, the pay is better, they're promising promotion if I do well, what can I have to complain about?
I soon found out. The young fellow from HR who showed me down to the "office" was openly laughing at me. I asked him what was so funny.
"You'll see soon enough," he said. And I did: the first clue was in the elevator, when he pressed the button for floor "LB".
"That's not the basement, surely?" I asked him. He just smirked. We stepped out of the elevator into an uncarpeted corridor: whitewashed breezeblocks, dim fluorescent lighting. It couldn't have been more different from the stylish décor and glass-walled offices upstairs. He walked ahead of me down a long corridor, then took so many turnings that I soon lost my bearings. Some of the doors that we walked past were closed, some were open into darkened rooms. In one, a group of men were sitting round a table talking in low voices. I paused at the door, and they looked up at me. As I walked on, there was a burst of coarse laughter behind me.
The man from HR stopped at a door labelled with the words "HR Department: Section D". He unlocked the door, reached inside to switch the lights on, then with a grin and a contemptuously extravagant gesture handed me the key.
"Your kingdom now," he said. I stepped inside.
For a few moments, I couldn't understand what I was seeing. Then, gradually, it started to come into focus for me. Racks on the wall and, hanging from them, chains, coiled ropes, leather devices with buckles, canes, things like a whip with multiple tails, electrical devices that I couldn't begin to understand. A leather-covered bench, with rings at the four corners. Something like a vaulting horse, also covered in leather. Something like a giant "X", the height of a person. I turned to my guide, who was openly laughing at my astonishment.
"Do you get it now?" he sneered. I could hardly speak.
"I'm supposed... to work here?"
"If you can call it work," he said.
"You mean...?"
"Sure. We send you the people that need... disciplining, and you discipline them. And"--he gestured to the cameras that I now saw on the ceiling around the room"--we watch you at work. To make sure you're doing a good job, you know." I felt sick. When he saw my expression, his attitude changed.
"Don't make a snap decision," he said. "Talk it over with your wife, sleep on it."
We did talk it over, of course. The pay made a difference: she wanted me to take the job--then. Now, she calls me a creep and a pervert too, though she's still happy to spend the money it brings in. Well, what wife ever said anything good about her husband?
"A real man would have a real job!" she told me last week, "not abusing innocent people like you do." As if I chose this.
The first few times someone knocked at the door, expecting nothing more than a written warning, I was more nervous than they were. But I settled into it. After a while it was just routine. I'd get a message saying who to expect, and what I should do to her--it was almost always a girl. To start off with, I enjoyed the sex too, though as I've got older I've worried that I wouldn't be able to do that part of the job for ever. All the time I've been doing it--years now--they've been promising me that promotion to the real HR office. But I don't believe in that any longer. It seems like any job I would ever have would be in a basement: "building superintendent" or "discipline officer", it makes no difference--I'll always be an underground person.
Then, last week, something very different happened. It was a quiet morning, no messages telling me to expect anyone. But at mid-morning the door opened without warning, and a girl stumbled into the room. And standing in the doorway behind her, glaring accusingly at me, was the woman who had pushed her in.
ANNA:
I like this job, I really do. The work is interesting, the people are fun--we go out together often, and they're always good company--the money is good, and I know there are possibilities for getting ahead. When I walk past the glass-walled meeting rooms, I often see some woman standing, elegant and poised, at the head of a long table, all eyes turned towards her. These women radiate confidence that they belong where they are, in charge of things. I'm going to be one of them, I can feel it.
The only part of the job that I don't like is when I have to take the minutes at meetings of the HR directorate. I can't understand why Juliette, the Chief HR Officer, wants me there. It's can't be because she likes me or rates my work--quite the opposite: she's made no secret of her feelings about me. But still she carries on, every time asking my boss to send me to take the minutes and send out follow-up actions, when she could choose any one from a dozen of her own staff. She's one of those self-confident women that I envy, but I wouldn't want to be like her--she's really hard and ruthless, and she terrifies me. So I make more mistakes, she criticises me still more harshly--vicious little jabs, always in a low tone, just loud enough for everyone to hear. I get flustered, more mistakes appear, it's a vicious circle. I'd complain about being bullied, but who would judge that complaint? HR, of course! At times I really hate her, but everything else about the job is good, so I stay.
That morning, I had a bad feeling the moment I saw her crossing the open-plan towards me. What could she be doing here? She belongs in the C-Suite upstairs, with the other top executives. We hardly ever see them here--I'd only recognise most of them because their faces adorn company announcements. Her face, though, I recognise from board meetings--and from nightmares. One of those seemed to be coming to life as it became clear that she was heading straight for me. She stopped by my desk.
"Come with me. Now, Anna," she said, her voice once again loud enough for everyone to hear. I gestured feebly at my screen and the open document that I was working on.
"But I have a deadline..."
"Now!" she said, more loudly. On all sides, heads turned. I rose and followed her, everyone watching.
JULIETTE:
I'm not usually at all impulsive, but that morning I just couldn't concentrate, and the idea suddenly came to me. I was thinking about Anna Hart, of course. I do wish I knew how that girl can get under my skin so effectively. She's nobody important, she means nothing to me--I don't even like her--and yet my mind still wanders back to her. Something about those big soft eyes makes me want to see them fill with tears, as they do every time I find fault with her work. That happens often, probably because I frighten her into making mistakes. It's very satisfying to watch, but that morning it just didn't seem enough: I'd found a particularly bad mistake that would have cost us thousands if I hadn't picked it up. Suddenly I remembered about the problems with Frank Alston, the discipline officer, and in a flash it came to me how I could solve two problems at once. I was on my feet and heading for her desk before I had time to think it over.
As strange as my behavior must have seemed to everyone, it was a pleasure to see her embarrassment and confusion when I summoned her from her work in front of them all. Of course, all that they were thinking was that she must be due for some normal HR procedure--a final written warning, perhaps, or maybe the beginning of a dismissal procedure. No-one would have guessed where I was taking her, because even those who'd had to visit Section D themselves were always called by an impersonal message from HR, not dragged there in person by the director. And Anna probably wouldn't even have heard of it; no-one who's been there wants to talk about it afterwards.
I led her to the elevator, the only one that goes down to the lower basement level. Even seeing the letters on the button, "LB", gave me a thrill, knowing what they meant. As the elevator went down, I fixed my gaze on her. I felt excitement rise, seeing that she was too intimidated to speak or even meet my eyes. I told myself that this was a professional visit: Frank Alston was one of those problems that even the most senior managers sometimes have to confront in person. But no purely professional visit had ever excited me like this.
The elevator doors opened on a dimly lit hallway, uncarpeted, with breezeblock walls. If it had been a movie set, the accompanying music would have been low and tense. I have to admit, I was taken aback--I'd never actually been down there myself, and I was surprised at quite how menacing it felt. And if I felt intimidated, how must Anna have been feeling? She found her voice at last:
"What are we doing here? Where are you taking me?" I just pushed her on in front of me. Luckily I knew the layout, I have a good memory for maps and directions.
ANNA:
