For those joining for the first time, all you need to know is that after months of secrecy, the Melbourne mailgirls are about to appear on prime time television. Needless to say, there is apprehension in the office.
Jan Stephenson was feeling a little wicked as she strode into the open plan area of the tenth floor. The tall athletic mailgirl knew that she always got a lot of attention from the predominately male IT staff working at their desks between her and Mitchell Johnson's office near far wall, which was her destination. It was now his office since he was no longer the boss of the office but assigned to special projects.
Jan had been a promising talent in the IT department when she used to work in clothes and had long ago rationalised the attention her totally naked body got from her once colleagues. And she played up to them. She sidled up to her old boss's desk and stood up straight in front of him knowing that he was staring at her firm breasts and small, hard nipples. God, she enjoyed this.
"Les," she purred at her former boss, "do you have any projects for me?" As she asked him, she flexed a knee wide knowing that her slit was now at his eye level. And he was looking straight there, speechless. "Oh well," Jan dramatically sighed, brushing her hair back in place which also shimmered her breasts for the IT manager's appreciation, "maybe next time," as she continued on towards Mitch's office. Les would never guess that she had hacked the mailgirls app and was now working on backdooring the rest of the office comms.
Jan found Mitch clearly biding his time in his isolated office. "Busy?" she asked him.
"What do you think?" he smiled. Jan smiled back at the former boss who had always been caring and respectful to her. She gave him an apologetic look with the news that Lindsay Davenport, his replacement, wanted to meet him 'as soon as he was free'. Which meant straight away. He got, ready to face the new boss.
Lindsay Davenport looked straight into Mitch when he entered her office. "You get a lot of mailgirl messages from the rest of the office," she started. He found it hard to tell if she was admiring or suspicious.
Mitch replied, offhand. "Most of those are from Shane. And most of those are premium wine tips or restaurant suggestions." Shane Crawford, deputy formerly to Mitch and now to Lindsay, was in the habit of what he called 'enhancing the work environment' or as others may think of it, avoiding his office responsibilities. So Mitch's assertion was plausible. Except that Mitch was in on Jan's hack and let the mailgirls use his office as a safe haven.
Lindsay seemed unconvinced though. "I don't see that many mailgirls on my floor," she pointed out. Shane's office was next to hers after all.
Mitch smiled. "You wouldn't see them coming and going from Shane's office when you are at your desk, I'm sure that there are many," he tried. "Maybe you're not using them enough? Or working too hard?" He made a mental note to warn the mailgirls to be more visible to Lindsay. But boy did he enjoy riling her. His wife was right. Lindsay could do nothing to him about it. He was untouchable.
*
Shane was back at the Sad Cafe. And was being served by the same waitress as the previous day, the one with attitude.
"I see you didn't bring your friend," she noted, waiting for his order. Referring to Stuart Broad, the manager newly arrived from the States with some problematic views about mailgirls. And about Australians in general. Shane was glad to be free of him. Even though there was a reason he was there alone.
"How did things go in the study group?" Shane countered the waitress with a grin suggesting he had worked her out. "And he's not my friend." Shane knew the study group did not exist, yet he imagined getting an invitation to debate the morality of naked women wandering an office with such people.
"Not your friend. That much was obvious," the waitress answered back. "Tell me, can he really get me work as a mailgirl?" For some reason, Stuart had held the opportunity out to her. Shane had no idea what that was about at all.
"I have no idea," Shane told her. "Depends if we're actually hiring. But you do have the attributes for it."
"What does that mean?" she asked, suspicious.
Shane gave her his boyish smile, the one designed to disarm. "It means that you are not unattractive and you are clearly capable of spending long periods on your feet."
"Thanks, I'll put that on my CV. Now what do you want to eat?"
Shane told her, and then looked deeply at her. "I'm here for a private meeting. Discrete and all of that. So if you could respect that when my guest appears, that would be great."
The waitress smiled. "I guess so. Although I need to discuss the ethics of that with my study group, you know." She smiled. Then thought for a moment. "Tell me, are you imagining me naked, in your office delivering messages?" She even posed, breasts thrust a little forward, legs astride.
Shane looked her up and down. "Well now I have a picture," he agreed.
"A picture?" She looked worried.
Shane shook his head. "A mental image," he corrected.
"Ah okay." She looked relieved. "Is it hard?" she wondered.
Shane stared down at his crotch. "Not particularly," he wondered.
She realised and giggled. "Not you, the job."
Shane of course was not at all embarrassed. "Looks like more work for the study group." He grinned that grin. "It depends. Have you ever spent all day wandering around naked amongst clothed workers?"
She shook her head. "Not much of an opportunity for it here."
Shane raised his eyebrows. "Well, there is one way to find out." They both smiled, probably for different reasons. The door swung open and Shane looked to the entrance. A middle aged man wearing dark glasses and carrying a large black bag was standing there. Shane nodded to the waitress who saw the man at the door too because that was her job. She went over and directed him to Shane.
The reporter kept his sunglasses on as the two men introduced themselves to each other. "Are you trying to attract attention to yourself?" Shane asked. The reporter raised one eyebrow above the glasses. "The sunglasses," Shane explained. Then checked himself. "You're not blind?" he asked.
"Oh, forgot I had them on." He removed them, revealing piercing blue eyes. He stared hard at Shane and got straight to the point. "I was hoping we had an arrangement."
"You're the press Johnny," Shane replied, "so we'll never let you into the building." He shrugged. "No journos inside," although he knew that was not the case.
The reporter Johnny O'Keefe shook his head. "You know that's not the case. We've all seen the trailers. Whatever's going to air on Tuesday night. That could have been us, trustworthy quality content. We're the ABC."
Shane explained to him that they had only let the crew in because of all the stringent conditions they had agreed to, what with the chances of others going in with hidden cameras secreted on their person or even just the chance for them to report outside the agreement on what they may or may not have seen. Privacy laws be damned. "We had total control over this one," Shane explained. "I would guess that sort of thing is not what your show would call journalism."
The waitress came back with their coffees. "I'm Monika," she told Johnny as she extravagantly placed his coffee in front of him, with a little thrust of breast thrown in. Shane looked at her curiously but she affected not to notice. Johnny looked determined, with those steel blue eyes of his. Monika lingered. "Can you make me a mailgirl?" she asked him.
For once, the reporter looked flustered. "No, I think you've got the wrong person. You should be asking him." He gestured at Shane.
"I already have," she complained. Shane affected not to look at Monika, so she started to move away.
"Are you going to tell me anything about your mailgirl program?" Johnny asked Shane.
Shane tried the charm. "What mailgirl program?" he asked. Monika's ears pricked up. She wasn't that far away from them and she stopped where she was.
Johnny sighed. "The one that your ultimate boss Mr Harada said publicly that you are running?" he tried.
Monika stepped back towards the two men, assessed the situation and grabbed a free chair from another table and sat down between them. "Yes, that program," she added staring at Shane, "the one you told me about."
Shane tried to ignore her and looked at Johnny. "Have you tried talking to him? If he knows all about it? Just phone him in Japan."
Johnny looked at Monika, trying to work out what sort of support she was giving him. "We tried," he told Shane. "His office says that there is nothing more to say about it than what he has already said in public."
Shane screwed up his face. "That doesn't sound like him. Usually you can't stop him talking about mailgirls." He laughed, to try to finish the topic.
"So I need to contact this Mr Harada?" Monika asked.
Shane looked horrified at her. "I wouldn't do that. You won't know where you might end up. By the way aren't you supposed to be working?"
Monika smiled at him as she looked around the cafe. "All under control. And are you supposed to be having clandestine meetings outside the office so no one knows?"
Johnny smiled. "She makes a good point." He looked to Monika. "Maybe you should leverage it." Then he looked back to Shane as he pulled a laptop out of his bag. "There's something I'd like you to look at." Shane sensed the ground was moving, to judge by Johnny's body language. He had a video cued up on the laptop.
In a grainy video a woman was kneeling naked on the floor of a cafeteria in the most common mailgirl pose. She had what must have been a phone strapped to her arm. To the edge of the image, people were standing around and to judge from the soundtrack they were supporting her protest. Suddenly the camera pulled back revealing another two women undressing and also strapping their phones to their arms. The three women led a chant which sounded like "The clothes stay on!" The video ended.
