My short lived career as a Computer Tech: Part III

Things were not going good.

Moral was at an all time low and all the employees of Computer City seemed to be a bunch of mindless Zombies. The morning pep talks had been replaced by lectures about how we had to get sales up. How that the location up north was kicking our ass in terms of sales. And amidst that, there were the ever looming take over threats that filled the air.

The guys in the Tech department seemed to not be effected at all. We just didn't really give a damn about the rest of the store, as we had no loyalties. We were all there for summer jobs, and thus if we got fried, we really didn't care. We continued on with our normal work days, pretending to fix computers while we really played network games of Quake and whatnot.

Then we got the notice.

"Paintball?!" Rhombus asked "They want us to do PAINTBALL now?!?" I took the note from him and skimmed over it.

"Hmmm…" I mused over the bright green pamphlet. "Looks like it. Next Sunday, Sales vs. Service vs. Management." I looked at our small band of rogue techs.

"Like THAT'S fair…" Xcalibre noted, "there are 5 of us against like 25 on each of their teams… "

"Well we know some guys in sales… like Carlos and Mike… I mean they are practially like us anyway, why not ask if they can join us."

"Hmmm…." I mused again, "Or better yet… let's get them to join us, as turncoats… they stay on their side, but they fight for our side."

"Hell ya Ech!" Rhombus squeeled, "That's a hell of an idea. Let's get a group of Vigilantes to join us!"

In theory it was a good idea… of course in theory Communism was good too. Go figure. So Sunday came and the store was closed promptly at 6PM, and everyone was loaded into a bus before we could escape home.

"So who did we end up getting Echster?" Rhombus asked franticly. I shushed him as The Suit was kinda close.

"I convinced Mike and Carlos of course, then we also got Adam, the Apple Rep, and Bob the Janitor."

"You got Bob?" Xcalibre poked his nose in. "Why the hell did you get Bob? Look at him! He can't run, he can barely walk! He's an easy target."

"…exactly…" I calmly stated. "Remember, he is a turncoat, thus people won't think to fire on poor old Bob… or at least it SOUNDS logical… doesn't it?" The others kinda nodded their agreement.

Once we got to the Paintball field we were herded off into separate rooms. The five of us looked pretty pathetic in our Blue Khakis.

"Blue?!?" Rogue bitched. "Why the HELL do we have to wear blue?!?! I mean blue isn't even Camouflage!"

"Man, it seems as though they are just out to get us…" Rhombus replied. "I mean come on… we're the only individuals there… they're bound and determined to break our spirits.

I looked at the band of five Techs. "Sure as hell seems like it." I tried to act like a leader and give a pep talk. "Come on guys, we'll do good… I don't care if we lose, just as long as we get The Suit. He is really pissing me off!" They seemed to agree.

And thus it began.

The less said about the actual Paintball battle the better I think. As it turned out, Carlos had let it slip before hand that they were Turncoating, and The Suit overheard. Not one to actually LET them be on our side, The Suit got more of his lackys to keep our insiders at bay. Well… except Bob. No one cared about Bob. In fact I think he sat under a tree the whole time or something…

Anyway, we got Slaughtered. There was red and green paint all over our Khakis and to further humiliate us and break our spirits, they also ordered the acrylic execution of Adam, Mike and Carlos. Yeah… they actually turned on their own kind. I was kinda pissed when we got back to the locker room.

"DAMNIT!" I whipped my helmet against the lockers. "What the HELL is wrong with The Suit?!?! What the hell did we do to him?!?"

The three turncoats used our locker room too, as they didn't feel like being ridiculed by the other zombies. Everyone was silent… until Rogue, the one who is always quiet spoke up.

"Red Queen Effect." Everyone looked at him.

"Red…Queen…Effect?" Rhombus stammered. Everyone else drew blanks.

"Red Queen…" I could remember something from Bio 231 coming back. "Isn't that part of Darwin's theory of Evolution… adaptation or something?"

"Not Darwin, but you're correct." Rogue explained. "It's the theory that in order to survive, you must continually keep two steps ahead of your predator. Take the Yucca Plant in Africa. The animals were picking it dead, so it evolved to have higher leaves. Well then before the animals could adapt longer necks (ie, giraffes) the Yuccas had already moved on, and created a Pollen Defense system where if one tree was attacked (ie, eaten) then it would send out a Pollen to the other trees to increase a type of poison production. It's called the Red Queen from Alice in Wonderland, how no matter what Alice did, it seemed as though the Queen was ahead of her."

"Yeah, that's all fine Rogue, but how does that help us?" I asked. Everyone else was bewildered.

"In order to defeat The Suit, we have to THINK like the Suit."

I sighed. I didn't know how good it was going to do to think like him. I looked down at my paint stained clothing. "Hmmm…." I pondered the possibility. "Think we could sneak these out of here?" I asked in general.

"Why the HELL would we want these?" Mike asked.

"Red Queen my friend." Everyone was even more bewildered. "We wear these as a sign that our spirits have been broken." Everyone seemed to like the idea, so we bundled up our Khakis into Carlos' bag, and snuck out back to the bus. Seeing as how there were only 8 or us in that room, no one seemed to monitor it very good.

So, as we had planned, those Red and Green stained Jumpsuits became our Symbol of rebellion. Well… at least for a little while. We all entered work the next day wearing those Paint stained uniforms and my to our shock… nothing happened. I mean talk about a let down. Here we expected The Suit to go all ballistic on us, and yet he didn't. not one word. It was obvious he noticed us, and yet… nothing.

"What's wrong with him?!" Xcalibre was a bit panicky. "I mean he hasn't said a word!"

"..i don't know!" I said trying to maintain some amount of order. "I mean by all rights he SHOULD have blown up at us…"

"it's red queen man…" Rogue said quietly. "he's evolved into…." Xcalibre and I stared at him crookedly. "..what?"

"Shut up with the damn red queen Rogue…" I snapped. "It's your bloody red queen that damn well got us into this…"

"…sorry ech." He said quietly.

"s'ok man…" I said more humbled. "He's getting to us is all. I mean none of us could have figured he would do this…" the others just nodded in silent agreement.

Rogue hunted for something in his bag. We didn't really pay attention to him until he pulled out a large Rifle.

"What the hell are you doing with that?!??!!" I screamed.

"Chill ech… it's a paintgun" He coolly replied. Everyone stared. "…. I thought we may need it."

"I don't get it…." Xcalibre pointed out,

"don't you get it X?" I said happily. "We're going to do every working man's dream… we're going to gun down the boss. …but with paint!"

The rest of the day we hatched a brilliant plan to enable us to get on the roof of the store around the time when The Suit was leaving. We convinced Bob to let us borrow his keys to the roof in which time we were able to smuggle Rogue's dufflebag with the paint gun and leave the door ajar. …now to just wait until 6…

At about 10 to 6 Rogue and I snuck up to the rooftop to execute the plan. It was bitter and windy, but we persevered. We positioned ourselves, and waited….

I looked at my watch. 6:13. "Damnit! Where the hell IS he?!?!" rogue shushed me.

"you have to be patient… it takes times to be a sniper." I merely scowled at him. Then about 5 minutes later we saw him in his Gucci suit stride out the front doors. "there he is…."

I watched at Rogue fired off a shot. It got caught in the wind and hit a beat up old beetle. "DAMNIT ROGUE!!!" I yelled in a whisper. He wasn't listening. He was already adjusting for the wind.

The second shot hit him dead on the back. I was silent. I could see Rogue smile. He fired off 5 more rounds as The Suit turned around to see what happened. One landed on his forearm, three on his chest and on sailed clear. We ducked behind the arch, out of site.

The suit shouted off a list of profanities as he tried to see his assailant. He couldn't see us behind the roof fixture.

He turned still shouting obscenities and we fired off more rounds at his back. He never even turned, merely kept walking. The final blow was to take pictures of him using one of the $3,000 digital cameras we snagged from the counter.

The Suit never even mentioned it… but from then on, he didn't wear $1,500 suits…

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The last thing I remember from Computer City, was the iMac Incident. At least that's what it was referred it after it happened. At the time it was just something I did for $20…

See, one of the things that the techs always seemed to do, is the infamous Twenty Dollar Challenge. Pretty much once a day someone would suggest something stupid, and the others would say 'ok, do it. $20 challenge.' One of the most remembered ones was running the VCD of SW: Episode 1 on the wall of monitors… 2 days before it was out in theaters. Hmm…. Come to think of it, the $20 wasn't real… because no one ever got it…

The final $20 challenge took place the day everyone got laid off, so it was fairly memorable. In the morning meeting The Suit announced that Future Shop had bought us out, and 'not to worry, there will be no layoffs!" …the lying bastard.

There was an imac on the sales floor that just wasn't selling… maybe because it didn't have enough Ram. Being the mac guy, leslie asked me to upgrade it. Oooooh… a challenge. I'd never upgraded an iMac before. All that I know is that you had to take apart the whole machine…

And so the final $20 challenge began.

I took off the Bondi blue case, and popped in the ram. I was about to put it back on, when I noticed that there was a removable plate in the bottom.

"hmmm…" I pondered. Xcalibre watched intently. I cautiously removed the plate, and found that I could easily slip my head in the hole. "Cool!!!!" Xcalibre couldn't contain his laughter. …I was wearing an iMac shell on my head.

I was about to take it off when Rogue came in. He sat there and stared at me for a minute. "I haaaaave no floppy drive!!!!!" I moaned. He lost it. He was doubled over laughing as well.

"okay ech…" he was able to stammer. "$20 challenge. You go out on the sales floor like that." I thought it over, and had to accept. The $20 Challenge could not be turned down… so off I went.

I cautiously ventured out on the floor, although it didn't matter since I was going to make an ass of myself anyway. Away I went to the Apple Store within a Store as the challenge dictated. Everyone was looking at me, but after 2 months there I had already lost all the dignity I had.

So there I was with a bondi blue imac shell on my head moaning about the lack of a floppy drive. The People in the Peecee section looked at me like I was a moron (which I was) and the guys in the Apple section thought I was an advocate! ….all I really was was a college freshman doing the $20 challenge.

Anyway, to immortalize the fact that FS bought out CC, there were reporters there… and seeing as how I was walking around with a bright blue computer on my head, need-less-to-say I ended up on the 6 o'clock news. Thrilling.

The suit ended my 'reign of terror' by dragging me back to the Tech room and saying that I was fired. He said we all were. He said that he really appreciated out services, but under the new ownership, they no longer needed us.

Technically, we were let go…. On paper, we were fired.

:/

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Well… that's it. Sorry it took so long to complete… I really am. Anyway starting soon (sooner than this took anyway…) I will be writing a regular column about my (mis)adventures in the UofC… where I get to do things like visit the games of hell, and ask the infamous question….'why is the printer wet?'

Thanks for reading, and stay tuned for Tech Support: 8611

Ech.