Unofficially. He was the only reason the company's legacy servers didn't spontaneously combust. Years ago, Jack had been a brilliant programmer. He had built the foundational architecture Omnicorp still relied on. But when the company got bought out and management shifted, the new executives pushed the original engineers out, replacing them with cheaper, inexperienced hires.
Jack had survived only by burying himself in the hardware department, taking a massive pay cut, and keeping his head down. He needed the health insurance. Without Omnicorp's premium medical coverage, Khloe's insulin would bankrupt him in a month. He walked through the service entrance, swiping his worn ID badge. The basement smelled of ozone, dust, and cheap industrial floor cleaner.
The servers hummed a massive, deafening drone that Jack found comforting. Machines made sense. If they broke, you diagnosed the problem. Replace the part and they worked again. Humans were messier.
Thornton. Jack didn't turn around. He kept ratcheting the bolt on the cooling rack. Thornton, you deaf? Greg Simon stepped into the narrow aisle.
Greg was the VP of infrastructure, a title he earned by kissing the right golf clubs. He wore a tailored suit that was too tight across his shoulders, radiating a thick cloud of designer cologne meant to mask the scent of stale liquor. "Greg hated Jack. He hated the way Jack looked right through him. He hated that Jack didn't laugh at his jokes."
"What is it, Greg?" Jack asked, wiping grease off his hands with a rag. The executive floor is complaining about network latency again. Greg sneered, checking his gold Rolex. Are you sitting down here doing crossword puzzles or are you going to fix it?
The latency isn't from my end, Jack said, his voice flat. It's your new cloud migration. You routed the DNS through a third party server that bottlenecked. I told you that in an email 3 weeks ago. Greg's face flushed.
The artificial tan deepened into an angry orange. You listen to me, you glorified janitor. I don't need back talk from a guy who buys his pants at a thrift store. I need it fixed. I don't have access to the cloud back end, Jack stated, stating a simple, immutable fact.
You revoked my admin privileges last year, remember? Security risk. Figure it out. Greg snapped, turning on his heel. He paused, looking back over his shoulder.
And clean up this aisle. It looks like a dump. We have the CEO touring the building tomorrow. If she sees this mess, it's your head. Jack watched him leave.
He looked down at his hands, calloused and scarred. He took a deep breath, pushing down the familiar hot spike of rage. "Think of the insurance," he told himself. "Think of the insulin." He turned back to the server rack.
The crash happened at 2:15 p.m. Jack was eating a smashed turkey sandwich in the basement break room when the emergency claxons started blaring. The red strobe lights painted the gray concrete walls in harsh, jagged flashes. He dropped his sandwich and sprinted toward the main terminal. The screens were cascading with red text. Total system failure.