Performance Review (Sci-Fi, Intergalactic 911).

By Joseph Wolfe

3036 words, approx 16 minute read.

Zed Guarde had rescued women from abusive boyfriends, stopped a double homicide in progress (which turned out to be the same alien almost being killed twice) and completed an on-the-fly hostage negotiation with no casualties. But more intimidating than all of that was the dreaded yearly performance review.

Not really. But…sort of. Despite Intergalactic 911 being a Intergalactic Republic program, the performance review was like any corporate job. First they tell you to relax, then they tell you everything that’s wrong with you, which is usually everything, then they give you a 0.5% raise and tell you to be thankful you’re getting anything at all.

The Gnodin supervisors were shuffling people in and out throughout the day. The green skinned aliens looked around the room with a single glance, their large eyes able to see a 200% wider field of view than a human’s.

But despite the lack of movement in those eyes, Zed knew immediately when they were on him.

“Zed Guarde, you are next.”

Zed changed his status to “away” before springing out of his chair, nerves propelling him at Mach point 5. The Gnodin casually held out a hand indicating the office.

“Please get comfortable, Mr. Guarde.”

Oh no, it’s started already, Zed thought as he eased himself down into the chair. 

The Gnodin super took a seat opposite him and pushed a button on the table. A hologram with data popped up, only readable from the side the Gnodin was sitting on.

“Are you friends with a Theodore Wilkins?”

Zed scratched his head. “Who?”

“He works in cyber security as a contractor for Intergalactic 911.”

“Oh, Ted? I…I’m not sure if we’re friends. I mean, maybe not by my standard of friends, but we play D&D together. We’ve had a campaign going for a few months and–”

“Is that a yes or a no?”

Zed swallowed back nerves. “I will go with…yes?”

The Gnodin typed into the digital keyboard.

“Sir, may I ask, is Ted in trouble? Am I in trouble?”

“Trouble?”

“I guess not then, right?” Zed wiped the sweat from his brow before realizing how gross that probably looked. The Gnodin didn’t seem to react, but it was hard to tell with this species.

“Mr. Guarde, you have exceeded expectations this year.”

Zed blinked. Did I just get a compliment?

“That being said, expectations were incredibly low considering your situation.”

Of course it wasn’t a compliment. Wait…what?

“What situation?”

The Gnodin definitely reacted to that question. “Nothing to be concerned about. I am approving a 15% raise. Keep up the good work.”

“Th-thank you,” Zed stammered. That was good money. That was life changing money. He started going through the list of things he could do with his 15% raise. Get his ship fixed, buy new games, save for something big. For once, he could buy Ted a beer for Dungeons & Dragons night instead of the other way around. 

But what did he mean by my ‘situation’?

“You can go now, Mr. Guarde,” the Gnodin announced.

Zed sprang up before the super could change his mind on the raise. “Good day. I mean goodbye.” He walked out of the office with the Gnodin closely behind, calling out the next dispatcher while Zed went back to his chair. His head was swimming, in a good way. He would probably be useless for the next few minutes while he processed the excitement, so he decided to take his first 15 minute break.

In the breakroom, Garrney was shooing someone away from the coffee maker so he could get his thirteenth-billion cup for the day. When he saw Zed, he shifted gears so his walker machine would take him over there.

“Zeddy! I hate to say it, but you’ve made coffee way too popular around here.”

“Sorry, Garrney. I seem to do many things unintentionally.”

“Better than most people do INtentionally, I think,” Garrney ribbed. “At least the other dispatchers don’t look at me like I’m crazy anymore.”

“You sure about that?”

Garrney bubbled out a chuckle. “I’m no human expert, but you look like something’s on your mind. Worried about your performance review?”

“I just had it, actually.”

“Oh boy.”

“And it went really well.”

“Oh. Boy!”

“The only thing is, the super said something about exceeding expectations considering ‘my situation.’ When I asked about it, he didn’t clarify, and maybe even seemed a bit…nervous. How does that make sense?.”

Garrney put the entire cup of coffee into his gelatinous form, slowly leeching the drink from the mug.

“Garrney…you know something, don’t you?”

“I try to. It helps from time to time.”

“You’re stalling. Come on, out with it. I only have twelve minutes left.”

Garrney continued to stall. The coffee maker hissed out the last few drops of a completed brew. “Time for more.” He turned his auto walker and started heading back to the coffee machine.

Zed got up and ran over to the machine, grabbing the carafe and slowly, very slowly, pouring coffee into a mug.

“No fair!” Garrney complained. “Bipeds! Always using those two legs against me!”

“You just have to tell me what you know, then this cup gets filled and I pass it to you.”

“Alright, alright. But the only reason I don’t want to tell you is I don’t want you to feel bad.”

Zed slowed the pour until it was only drips going in.

“You know you’re the only one of your species here at the call center. Well, truth is, you’re the only one at all the call centers in all the Galactic Republic.”

Zed stopped the pour entirely. “I am?”

Garney flipped a switch and a mechanical arm swiped the carafe from Zed’s hand. “Got it!”

“Come on, Garrney, what’s your point?”

Garrney quickly poured the coffee into a separate cup, then shoved that one into his body. “There was a complaint from human colonies that they had no representation in emergency services. The government thought it too dangerous to make humans Peace Officers, so they hired one as a dispatcher.”

Zed started putting the pieces together. “I’m a diversity hire?”

“Yep!” Garrney said as he removed the first cup from his body. It was covered in goo, and he slotted it into the dish scrubber and turned it on. A laser cleaned it top to bottom in seconds.

“Oh. Why…I mean, I guess…that’s fine…right? I just don’t know why I didn’t know.”

“Nobody told you because there’s politics involved, but there you go.”

Zed and Garrney went back to the table together. Zed took a seat and rested his chin on his hands on the table. I thought I was doing a good job. Guess they just gave me a raise to make themselves look good.

“Are you mad at me, Zeddy?”

“What? No, of course not. Thanks for telling me.”

“But it’s got you down, huh?”

“I guess not. Maybe. I guess…I applied for this job because it was decent pay and I wanted off the government dole. Also, I liked the idea of helping people. Now it just feels weird.” Zed looked around for a moment to make sure no one was listening in. “I got a 15% raise. I thought I had earned it. Now I’m wondering if they just want me to keep quiet and not make a fuss.”

“Wowza! 15% is definitely not-make-a-fuss money. Congratulations!”

“Thanks…I don’t mean to sound ungrateful. I’m thrilled. I was thrilled. I just don’t know what I think about all this now.”

“I think coffee. Coffee thinks me. It’s a symbiotic relationship I highly recommend. Why not get another cup and relax?”

Zed lifted up his head and sighed. “Thanks but no thanks. I’ve had too much today already.”

“Too much coffee? Explain this concept.”

In spite of himself, Zed chuckled. “Garrney, I cannot think of a concept more difficult to explain to you.”

“Even mating rituals?”

“Stop proving me wrong.”

Garrney bubbled out another chuckle. For a few minutes, he was quietly enjoying coffee while Zed worked the whole “diversity hire” situation around in his mind. The Gnodin also said he had exceeded expectations. So…wasn’t that a good thing? Haven’t I done humanity proud? That thought just made it all worse. I don’t want to “do humanity proud.” What if I screw up tomorrow and get someone killed? In most jobs, that would be an overdramatic thought. But Intergalactic 911 dispatchers had to be very fast and very precise with everything. One wrong digit in an address, and the Peace Officers are two systems over wondering why there’s nothing wrong there, while the caller is having her house broken into. 

All the while, the loud thumping in the lock is sounding through the phone and she’s screaming for the help that went to the wrong address.

“Garrney, what if I mess up and I make all humans look bad?”

“I don’t know, Zeddy. But you can’t make it any better worrying about it.”

“But I feel like now I owe it to my species to do a good job. Before I knew about this, it was just me. My species has been struggling to adapt to interplanetary life, and there’s a lot riding on my shoulders.”

“That was true before you knew it and you did great. You’re good at your job, Zeddy. Just keep up the good work. I know it’s not that easy, but give it a shot.”

“Shot of espresso maybe.”

“Oh ho ho! I’ve been working on convincing management to get an espresso machine. Maybe now that coffee is popular…”

Whatever Garrney was saying next, Zed didn’t hear. The breakroom TV was reporting on some kind of terrorist attack involving humans. Terrorist attacks happened now and again in some of the battleground systems of the Republic, but this one was only one system away.

That meant a lot of calls would be coming in.

“Times up?” Garrney suddenly asked.

Zed pointed to the TV. “I should get back.”

“I won’t keep ya. Whatever you need to do to keep your chin up, Zeddy, please do it. For me, it’s hitting this switch.” Garrney flipped a lever and a small tray slid up his chest and pushed his face up.

Zed chuckled. Garrney was certainly an optimist. “Thanks.”

With his excitement adequately curtailed, Zed returned to his chair and set his status to ready. There was an uptick in calls regarding what was on the news; Zed worked with the other dispatchers to get a handle on things and route information to the Peace Officers. It was actually a nice distraction. 

Of course, calling such a thing as a terrorist attack “nice” only made sense to other dispatchers. 

After a couple of hours, things settled down. The terrorist attack turned out to be pretty minor due to glitches in black market laser pistols causing them to malfunction. Even so, two people died. Zed and his team saved a lot of lives by acting fast, but those two would stick with him. Don’t look them up on the Intergalactic Web when you get home, Zed. Don’t do it. Don’t do it.

Eventually, Zed’s mind began to wander back to his performance review, and his…situation. Jobs in the Galactic Republic were highly specialized, and for every job, there was some alien that was better at it than anyone else. In the early days of the republic, it caused a lot of problems. Factions formed around the trades, and there was a lot of political fighting that sometimes turned to violence. So the government started mixing up what species worked what jobs. Zed’s history professor taught him that tensions cooled after the Job Reassignment Program, or JRP, but some of the calls Zed got now and then said otherwise.

Humans were considered a generalist species. In a universe of specialization, that made finding work hard. A lot of them were on the dole. Human cities were depressing places to be. Zed had settled into a cramped apartment in a big city, and he only saw other humans from time to time. That is, not counting Ted, who he saw weekly to play D&D. 

Zed always wanted to strike out on his own and make something of himself rather than living off the dole. Surviving work life and paying for his own needs was more than most humans were doing these days, but he still couldn’t shake the feeling he hadn’t earned it.

Diversity programs are supposed to be in the past…If the Galactic Republic only hired me to fill a quota, isn’t that like being on the dole?

He felt the depression slowly creeping back into full blast. Remembering Garrney’s advice, he lifted his chin up comically high, then immediately felt silly. “It was worth a shot,” he mumbled.

The red light was flashing again, the only way to stop it was to push it.

“Intergalactic 911, what system are you in?”

Zed punched the clock, figuratively, though he felt like doing it literally. He stumbled outside toward his banged up Starflight Zepplin and fussed with the door handle. It was broken in several different ways and opening it was like running through a combination on an old lock. With everything on his mind, he kept messing up his tricks for opening it. He finally focused and fiddled the handle correctly, and the cockpit opened. He jumped in and closed it, punching in an address into his pilot-navigation assistance to find the best route. He knew the best way home on his own, but it was D&D night with Ted. Ted was a remote employee, but as it happened he lived in the same system, and it was only one jump with the hyperspace gate. Zed could get there in person and that was always way more fun than remoting in. Plus, they would drink beer together. Always a plus.

The Starflight Zepplin raced towards the sky where the atmosphere was thin, then none. The first time he witnessed this miracle, it took Zed’s breath away in more ways than one. Now he hardly noticed. 

Zed hadn’t thought much about it before, but while he was waiting in queue for the gate, he realized how unusual it was that Ted was also human, and that they had found each other. Maybe that’s why Ted took such a shine to him so fast. That first conversation he had with Ted was what Zed thought he was getting in trouble for. Ted had asked him about joining the D&D group over the recorded line. Ted played it off at the time and it seemed like there were no repercussions.

Or maybe, none for him, but some for Ted.

His turn for the jump. He lined up, obeying all the commands coming over his ship’s radio without actually listening. He had heard them so many times before. The light flashed green, and he made the jump.

Arriving in the Banalock system, he made the flight to Ted’s place. The IT nerd had done pretty well for himself and owned a small home with a yard and a fence. Zed was the first one there, as usual. Coming straight from work, he was always 30 minutes early, but he would just shoot the breeze with Ted and go over character sheets for a while. Ted insisted on backup after backup characters, but so far in the campaign, no one’s character had died. 

Zed docked, or more accurately, parked just outside. His ship was much easier to get out of than in, so after he scooped up his backpack with his dice and his Holopad with all his characters, he jumped out with ease.

Ted’s ship wasn’t parked in its usual spot.

Zed paused. “Huh.” He checked his phone, but he wasn’t any earlier than usual. Ted was probably making a last minute beer run. He texted Ted that he was there and waited for a response. Ten minutes passed without even a “read” notification. Maybe his phone is dead and his ship is at the shop for repairs? It didn’t hurt to ring the bell.

Zed walked up to the front door and realized he couldn’t ring the bell because it was missing. Ted had one of the doorbells with a camera and it was pretty large, so there was no way he was missing it. Plus there was a bright spot in the paint where it had been.

“Guess we’ll do this the old fashioned way.”

Zed knocked on the door…and it moved. It’s open? He pushed it the rest of the way and said, “Ted? Hello?”

No answer.

This is getting creepy. He stepped inside. The place was its usual level of mostly clean. The kitchen counter had a few dishes; Ted’s faux-leather jacket hung draped across one of the chairs at the kitchen table, and a thin layer of dust covered the shelves and the tops of the cabinet doors, but other than those few things, it was pretty organized.

“Ted? Are we D&Ding tonight?” Zed called out, feeling increasingly awkward. He checked his phone one more time, then his email, making sure he had come on the right day. Yep, Wednesday, same as every other week.

Zed walked into the living room where they always set up their game. Ted’s holo-table was lit up with their characters already set up in the dungeon they were in from last session. An open can of beer was on the table. It was Ted’s favorite, “Orc Slayer IPA.” Zed walked over and put the back of his finger on the can. It was still cold.

“Ted? You in the bathroom?”

The door to the only bathroom was open; no one in there.

Zed pulled out his phone and tried calling Ted. Hi there, you’ve reached Ted’s voicemail box. You can leave a message, but I will probably forget to listen to it and just call you back. Thanks.

Zed walked over to the bedroom door and knocked. “Ted?” He tried the handle; it was unlocked. This is so awkward. He slowly stepped into the room, hoping to find a fully dressed Ted at his computer. The bedroom was messy, with more clothes on the floor than in the closet, but no Ted. There was a large green curtain that Zed knew had Ted’s computer setup behind it. Ted would sometimes livestream games or make D&D advice videos there, and he changed the background to whatever he wanted. 

There’s…not going to be a body behind this curtain…nope. Not a body. Not a body. Zed kept repeating the phrase as he put out his hand and pulled back the curtain in one big swoop.

Nothing.

“Ok good,” Zed blurted out, then immediately bit off the words. On the edge of the desk was a red smear, and more drops of red on the carpet. There was a red smudge on this side of the green curtain, and Zed followed a trail leading out the back bedroom window.

Zed felt a massive surge of adrenaline and anxiety. Is this Ted’s blood? He thought back to the Gnodin asking him if he knew Ted. Did the super know something was wrong? Then he thought about the terrorist attack that happened earlier in the day. But that wasn’t here, that was one system over.

But one system over was still pretty close, much closer than most of the bad things that happened in the universe usually were.

Zed slapped himself to break off the shock. He needed to act fast. “Scrap, scrap, scrap!” he mumbled. his hand shaking as he pulled out his phone. Despite only needing to tap three numbers, it took him multiple attempts to get his shaking hands to dial the number he knew better than anyone else.

“Intergalactic 911, what system are you in?”

TO BE CONTINUED…