System Jazz

"Did you make that noise?"

And here we have Baldie Baldwin in person.

He pokes his head out of his office to look for the source before greeting.

"Sounded like someone tried to blow up this place. How's the Deep Dive?"

"Oh, um, the controller, yeah, it's pretty wild. The game is a piece of crap though."

For now, let's focus on the crime prevention program.

The Girl dashing into the Old Fox's office caused existential dread already.

It's better not to think about what she might do or say there.

"And the sound? The Chief Inspector took the day off but that came from his office."

This is worth a prayer even if I'm an atheist.

If the bad cop's out, the Girl can fume all she wants without causing an execution.

When Baldie steps towards the door it bursts out though.

"Ah, that. We ran into each other with the trainee Girl at the entrance."

Let's keep the explanation brief, he doesn't need to know the details.

The high-pitched voice betrays me, and he's not an idiot, not to notice.

"Asspirant Lee. She slammed the door for some reason."

"For some reason?"

He raises an eyebrow, before rubbing the saddle of his nose.

"That's not how you pronounce that rank. You didn't make anal jokes, did you? - Of course you did, oh boy. Your parent's never told you it's a dick move to make fun of people's names?"

"I didn't? Not on purpose, at least."

This denial is like a confession and the pitch gives it away immediately.

He shakes his head with this judgemental look before turning towards his office.

Well at least she's alone in there, and he didn't push it.

"Fine, whatever, you'll apologize later. Let's get on with this."

He holds the door open and offers the same chair as the day before, without the handcuffs this time.

"I hope you know how stupid it would be to have a beef with your future handler. So did the controller work fine?"

"It was all right. A pain to figure out how it works, but I managed."

It's uncomfortable to be back in his office.

"It's not like a VR headset to put it on while standing, and there was no documentation to explain it. Lesson learned the hard way."

"That should have been obvious. And what do you mean, no documentation? Wasn't there a booklet in the box?"

He asks, sitting at the main table where the Old Fox recorded his investigation earlier.

"Not that a Boogle search wouldn't explain everything in two seconds."

"No, it only had the headset and a charger. And sure, but the old PC takes ages to boot, so it took a while to figure it out. How to put it, it was a strange first experience."

A booklet flies across the room after he rummaged on his desk, and his behavior is quite aggressive.

"Take this one if they left it out."

He offers and leans back on his chair.

The body language seems hostile compared to yesterday.

Is he pissed because upsetting the Girl?

And did he say she's the handler?

What's a handler anyway?

"So what about the game?"

"Yeah, I don't like it at all." It's my turn to let out a big sigh.

"Why? What's wrong with it?"

"Everything's behind a paywall and they explain nothing. Then that impossible quest right off the bat, with a tight schedule."

The complaint leaves him scratching his head.

"Sure, it's a new title, but at least see if it's even possible to complete a mission."

"It is, I did it in less than six hours." He claims, raising an eyebrow.

"The recruiters had to go through the program too, so you can stop bullshitting. The learning curve is steep but that's it. How far did you progress with the quest after the tutorial?"

"I didn't do the tutorial..."

"What?!" The friendly cop from yesterday is gone.

Did he only help to mess with his colleague? Now he yells.

"You complain that the system doesn't explain stuff, and you skipped it? They even give you a decent starting gear. The tutorial's enough to reach the third or fourth level."

"Well, in most games it's simple stuff, like how to move around. There was no problem with that. The controller at least got that much right."

This answer doesn't please him.

"Like, nobody does tutorials. They're lame, and the options should be obvious anyway."

"Didn't they prompt you to do it?"

"Oh, they did. It was super annoying."

It would be impossible to count how often that message popped up.

"If you can't handle the controls, try the tutorial or something. Whenever a question came up, this was the answer. And the other was to get Premium."

"What do you mean?"

He raises his eyebrow higher.

"Well, you know, the message that everything's behind a paywall, and subscribe to Premium? Even for basic settings and for crafting and all."

I give him a piece of mind.

"That's so cringe, locking everything after offering to play free."

"It's not a free-to-play game. Why would the devs work for free?"

He points it out, and his next sentence is an eye-opener.

"They have an unlimited free trial, and we gave you ten credits for a reason. Didn't you subscribe with the starter discount?"

The long silence tells him more than intended.

"What did you do with the ten credits, Arnim?!"

He asks, running out of patience.

If only there were a way to shrink in plain sight.

No, he would stomp me like the Kid did with that vanilla cigarette.

"Or what did you think it was for? It's in the contract you signed, did you read it?"

"N-no... You said to play twelve hours and gave it after the guard house so there was no time for anything."

It's a weak excuse and his gaze causes more sweating than yesterday.

To make it worse, he isn't letting the matter drop.

"What did you do with the credits? You can still subscribe."

"I um, didn't eat for two days, so spent it on food and smoke."

Saying only food wouldn't make it believable, yet mentioning the cig was a mistake.

He slams his desk, looking way scarier than his balding head and mustache should allow.

"The withdrawals almost killed me, okay?"

"Oh boy, you are a special kind of stupid, aren't you?" He shakes his head, leaning back to calm himself down by fiddling with the keys of his safe.

"Okay, no wonder you said it was tough. How far did you get?"

"Uh, still at the start. I leveled up first, but then it reset for some reason, after a zombie encounter. The inventory's gone too."

Listing the things makes him sigh.

"I jumped in head first, then searched for methods on Wroddit, and they all said crafting."

"And that's when you realized, it's Premium only and you wasted the credits on cigarettes. Is that correct?"

He gets a silent nod as an answer and rubs his temple.

"Okay, it's not great. Can you borrow some money from your dad?"

"No, he doesn't have any." It's better to say he's broke than he's gone.

"Well, you have gone and done it then..."