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TThhee BBaassttaarrdd OOppeerraattoorr FFrroomm HHeellll
BBaassttaarrdd OOppeerraattoorr FFrroomm HHeellll ##33
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So I'm working so hard I barely have time to drive into town and watch a
movie before I told people their printing will be ready. The queue's
WAAAAAY too long to have everything printed (and sorted) by the time I
told them, so I kill all the small jobs so there's only 2 left and I can
sort them in no time.
Then, after the movie, (which was one of those slack Bertolucci ones
that takes about 3 hours till the main character is killed off in a
visionary experience) I get back and clear the printouts.
There's about 50 people waiting outside and I've got two printouts.
That's about average for me. I thought I'd killed more tho. Anyway, I
put out the printouts and walk slooowly inside, fingering the clipboard
with "ACCOUNTS TO REMOVE" in big letters on the back. No-one says
anything. As usual.
. . .
I'm sitting back in the Operations Armchair, watching the computer room
closed circuit TV, which just happens to be connected to the frame-
grabber's Video player (sent off for repair, due back sometime in '97)
when the phone rings. That must be the 2nd time today, and it's really
starting to get to me!
"Yes?" I say, pausing the picture.
"I seem to have accidentally deleted my C.V!" the voice at the other end
of the line says.
"You have? What was your username?"
He tells me. What the hell, I AM bored.
"Ah no, you didn't delete it - I did."
"What?"
"I deleted it. It was full of shit! You didn't ever get more than a B-
in any of your subjects!"
"Huh?"
"And that crap about being a foreign exchange student, that was your
girlfriend and we both know it!"
"Huh?!!"
"Your academic records. I checked them, you were lying.. Besides which,
you forgot to include your criminal record.."
"How did y.." He clicks. "It's you isn't it? THE BASTARD OPERATOR FROM
HELL!"
"In the flesh, on the phone and in your account.... You shouldn't have
called you know. You especially shouldn't have given me your username.."
>clickety< >click< "Neither should you have sent that mail to the System
Manager telling him what you think of him in such graphic terms..."
"I didn't send any.."
>clickety< >click<......
"No, you didn't did you? But who can tell these days? Not to worry
though, It'll all be over VERY soon.." >clickedy click< "..change my
username back, and..."
"b-b-b.." he blubs, like a stood-up date
"Goodbye now" I say pleasantly, "you've got bags to pack and a life to
start over..."
I hang up.
Two seconds later the red phone goes. I pick it up, it's the boss. He
mumbles the username of the person I was just talking to, mentions
something about a nasty mail message, and utters the words "You know
what to do...", with the dots and everything.
Later, inside the Municipal Energy Authority Computer, as I'm modifying
the poor pleb's Energy Bill by several zeros, I can't help but think
about what lapse of judgement - what act of heinous stupidity - causes
them to call. Then, even later, when I'm adding the poor pleb's photo
image over the top of the FBI's online "MOST Wanted Armed and Dangerous,
SHOOT ON SIGHT" offenders list, I realise I'll probably never know; but
then life goes on.
A couple of hours later, as I see the SWAT vehicle roll up outside the
poor pleb's apartment I realise that for some, it just doesn't.
But tommorrow is another day.
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