Corplandia.
Fields of grey under a washed out, pallid sky.
A flat breeze carrying soporofic piano melodies that crackle on occasion with the degrading connection to the mainframe that seeds out thousands and thousands of connections all playing from speaker to microphone to speaker to microphone to -
A silver sedan with faux leather seats takes you from the pick up point into the city. They put you up in a box of a room, deep in a maze of endless grey towers of uniform height and uniform width and uniform spacing that draw on and on to an insipid horizon. Indoors the air still smells of oil. The carpet, cheap and tacky, is printed with dollar signs. The linen is clean but the threadcount is as low as your expectations.
You wake startled some time in the middle of the night when a haunting voice blares YOUR CALL IS IMPORTANT TO US, PLEASE RATE YOUR EXPERIENCE WITH OUR SERVICE so loudly that the windows rattle in their steel frames. You finger a gap in the blinds and peer out into the street but the rows and rows of carbon copy windows remain dark. You don't sleep after that, and the voice manifests two more times before the sun begins its weary struggle to pierce the decumbent clouds.
They see you at 9:20am. You are escorted into a room where several men stand laughing stiffly, coffee in identical plain white mugs held at 45 degree angles from their bodies, knuckles white. They turn to you as you enter the corner office with its floor to ceiling windows, laughter stilling in unison, their eyes trying to flatten you with condemnation in the heavy silence.
“Please state your concern.” One of them says, something brittle at the edges of his voice.
“Criticism is valuable and will be addressed.” Another slowly lowers his mug to the desk.
You look at all of them, one after the other, into their seething eyes. You straighten your back.
“You're the ones that called me here.”
“We should talk this through, like adults- “There's no need for hostility- “We can resolve this to the benefit of everyone involved, if you'll just-
“Just what? Do things your way?”
“Our experience in these matters is- “Collectively, we represent- “We only have your best interests-
“Nah. I didn't come here to debate.”
You nod to the window, and in unison, they turn.
A rainbow arcs brilliantly across the sky in the distance, a break in the clouds drowning a small corner of the city in warm, inviting sunshine. The buildings it touches manifest colours, pink, blue, purple. The windows that catch the sunlight glitter in an effusion of brilliance.
The endless piano tune crackles and stops playing for three entire seconds before beginning again, weaker.
A coffee mug falls to the floor. The handle breaks off and spins away to vanish under a filing cabinet.
- Thanks to FrostPoem and SecretSloth for the inspiration and banter :D