EVERYBODY
NEEDS A
BATGIRL
PART FIFTEEN: Goodbye and Oh Hell.
“It’s done!” Cassandra looked over her shoulder just as the door to her boss’s office swung open. He was grinning ear-to-ear as he swaggered from his office.
Unfazed and unimpressed by mere claims, Cassandra crossed her arms. “Really finished?”
He fished a black, plastic fob from his pocket. It was a flash drive, one of the dozen or so scattered around his office. “On this drive…as well as the source code repository on my work station, and the external drive attached to it, as well as a secure off-site host…but you get my point. On this drive, I have the final, working version of W.E.I.I.R.D.”
“Wee-urd?”
Her boss waggled his eyebrows as he explained, “It’s an acronym. Acronyms are cool.” He flashed another quick smile before launching into an explanation, “W.E.I.I.R.D. is the new Wayne Enterprises Intranet Infrastructure for Research and Development. It’s the system Bruce hired me to create to fully utilize Wayne Enterprises’ computer power. When the Wayne offices are closed in Singapore, the Wayne offices in America can use their workstations for processing power. It’s a globally rolling super-cluster that…Hey!”
Before he could blink, Cassandra snatched the memory drive from her boss’s hand. “And the new Bat-computer?” she whispered.
Cassandra’s boss nodded. “Oh, yes, that too. Plug that into any computer on the W.E. network, and you can appropriate the full resources of W.E.I.I.R.D. for whatever you need. Riddle solving, joke busting, web crawling, you name it.”
“So you are finished?” Cassandra asked.
Her boss’s face fell slightly. “Yeah…” He looked down at the floor. “I mean, I’ve got to give this to Bruce, show him the documentation, but…yeah.” Cassandra handed her boss the memory drive back.
When he took the drive from her hand, Cassandra launched herself at him. She wrapped both arms around him and squeezed. “Miss you.” Cassandra smiled sadly as she felt the hug reciprocated. Before either could say anything else, someone on the far side of Cassandra’s desk coughed.
They both turned to see a Wayne Enterprises employee. “Excuse me, is this the IT department? I was checking email, and now my workstation won’t get on the Internet.”
“eBay?” Cassandra asked.
The employee’s eyes brightened. “Well, it was an email saying my account was expired, and when I followed the link, my computer froze.”
“(Nice call.)” Cassandra’s boss doted. Cassandra crooked a half smile. “Well, as luck would have it, I am IT, and I can come fix your computer! I’ll be there very shortly.”
The employee happily cheered and headed back toward the elevators. Cassandra’s jaw dropped and she looked at her boss with amazement. “You’re going?”
Her boss shrugged, tossing the jump drive up in his hand. “Did I mention that W.E.I.I.R.D. is also an anti-virus suite? Hey, remember, I’ve worked here too. Think I’m going to let these idiots mess up my baby? Nuh-uh!”
~~~
Bruce Wayne tucked the external harddrive into his desk drawer and locked it. Tomorrow, he decided, he’d talk to Lucius about the roll out of W.E.I.I.R.D. He also decided he’d see about changing the name.
Cassandra was sitting across his desk, watching him, waiting. “Good work, Cassandra,” he told her, trying not to sound too much like Bruce Wayne. “This wouldn’t have happened without your help. She shrugged, and Bruce knew what she meant: you’re welcome, glad it worked, I’ll miss him.
“I’ve got another project for you, if you’re up for it.” Her gaze shifted to acknowledge that she was. “It’s research and development by an outside, special contractor.” He stressed “special” in both tone and posture to convey its true meaning. “Aeronautics this time.” Before he could continue further, Bruce’s phone rang.
After answering it, he said, “Yes? He’s here? Thank you. Please send him in.” He hung up the phone.
“New boss?” Cassandra asked.
Rising from his desk, Bruce nodded. Cassandra followed his lead, just as the door opened. From the waiting area outside, the man entered into Bruce’s office. He was about Bruce’s height, much softer, and his hair was no where near as neatly combed. Cassandra could tell from his walk he was absorbing as much information about the room as he could, more than most would.
“Glad you could make it,” Bruce welcomed the newcomer. He stepped over to the man and shook his hand. “Cassandra Cain,” Bruce nodded to Cassandra, “This is who you’ll be assisting. Allow me to introduce Dr. Cameron McKay.”
PART FOURTEEN: Everyone Needs… An Intern?!
Cassandra watched her boss fidget and squirm. He was giving his lunch only a very small portion of his attention. The rest was dedicated to listening as best as he could to conversation going on between the software developer and intern behind him.
Watching the developer and intern, Cassandra had picked up on the fact that the developer was enjoying giving his lecture — whatever it was about — a lot more than the intern was hearing it. Despite various attempts from the blond intern to interrupt, the developer kept on talking, much to the irritation to both the intern and her boss.
“And that,” the developer said, “is why everyone who cares at all about modern programming should learn to write in a static language. Dynamic languages are just toys, and no one in their–”
“That’s it!” Cassandra’s boss cried out. He stood up from chair, and started counting on his fingers. Cassandra watched, amused, as her boss counter-lectured the developer on, as best as she could tell, computer languages. Everytime the developer would raise a point, her boss would vehemently counter it.
This went on steadily for several minutes, drawing in other developers and engineers from around the cafeteria. Each side would argue, and the other would counter. As the top of the hour got closer, and lunch times began to finish, the debate dwindled.
“Fine,” the original developer conceded, “static and dynamic languages aren’t inherently better or worse.” He muttered to himself and checked his watch. “Come on,” the developer said to his intern, “let’s go.”
The intern shook his head. “You go,” he said. “I’m staying with him!”
“What?” the developer and Cassandra’s boss sputtered at the same time.
“He knows way more than you do!” the intern said.
Cassandra’s boss seemed at a loss for a good reply. The developer, however, did not lack one. “You can’t do that. You’re assigned to me. That’s how it works.”
“I don’t care,” the intern said.
The developer scowled for a minute, then his smile brightened. “You know what,” he said, “I think that’s a great idea. You stay with him. I’ll make sure everything is okay. Good luck!”
“Now wait a minute,” Cassandra’s boss cried out. It was too late. The developer had made a break for the stairwell Cassandra considered catching him, but something made her pause.
Not just something, it was the intern. His face was beaming as he switched tables, coming to sit with Cassandra and her boss. It wasn’t anything but an earnest excitement.
“Look, I appreciate the compliment, but I don’t need an intern. That’s why I have Cassandra.” Cassandra’s boss grunted as a two-inch heel dug into his shin.
“I know all about you two,” the intern said. “Everyone talks about what goes on in your office.” Cassandra scrunched her face slightly as the intern waggled his eyebrows suggestively. “Everybody knows about how you tied her up in your office, and how it was a wreck when security got there.”
[See chapter twelve for an explanation - Editor]
“Now wait a minute, I don’t know what you heard, but that was not–”
“They all call you the ‘Pervy Admin,’” the intern said, grinning.
Cassandra shook her head, smiling. No one but Bruce, herself, and her boss knew about not!Tim and Betty. She knew about the rumors circulating Wayne Enterprises, and she also knew how oblivious her boss was about them.
“Pervy Admin?” he muttered to himself.
He was about to reply, most likely to defend his name, but was cut-off by the intern. “Anyway, now that’s settled, and since I know your name, Pervy Admin, and her name, Cassandra,” the intern spoke, “let me introduce myself!”
“My name’s Naruto Uzumaki! And I’m going to be the world’s greatest hacker!”
[Sure, you ask, what does Naruto know about computers? Well, I ask, what did he know about being a ninja in the first episode? Answer to both: very little. - Editor]
PART THIRTEEN: You can’t spell damage without HP
“FROM HELL’S HEART, I STAB AT THEE!”
The door to Cassandra’s boss’s was kicked open. It swung open as far as it could, hit the rubber door stop on the wall, and promptly bounced closed again, right in her boss’s face.
“CRAP!” he cried out behind the door. The fading sounds of footsteps followed.
Cassandra rolled her eyes. not!Tim and Betty, on the other hand, vaulted across the office. By the time they reached the door, he was halfway to the elevators. Neither paused as they gave chase out into the corridor.
That, Cassandra guessed, was the plan. Her boss was a lot of things, but he was not a fighter. Per their working arrangement, he was pretty good at getting people’s attention, whether those people were from the accounting floor or from another reality. She was good at dealing with those kind of people.
With them gone Cassandra set to work freeing herself from her imprisonment, which was as easy as yanking the armrests from the side of the cheap office chair and cutting through the tape with the bat-shaped shuriken hidden under the waistband of her skirt.
That was only part one, Cassandra reminded herself. She still had to perform part two: save her boss without blowing her cover as a Wayne Enterprises secretary. Cassandra grinned. She loved a challenge.
~~~
“Really, guys, I think you misinterpreted what I said.” not!Tim looked at Betty. Betty looked at not!Tim. “What I said was, ‘Stay back there,’ yeah, I saw a spider and wanted to be sure to step on it before you came out.”
not!Tim smirked. Betty rolled her eyes. Cassandra’s boss tried to back further into the corner of a dead end hallway.
“You’re not buying that, are you?” Both teens shook their heads. Cassandra’s boss snapped, “Well I’d like to see you come up with something that sounds like ‘From hell’s heart, I stab at thee.’ Try it. You can’t. It’s like trying to find a work that rhymes with orange. Go range? Flow mange? It’s not easy.”
Betty growled, “Shut up!” not!Tim looked as surprised as Cassandra’s boss at her outburst. “I don’t see how she stands you. If you’re now prattling on nonsense like this, you’re trying to use Cassandra to avoid doing your job. We’ll actually be doing her a favor when we get rid of you.”
“There’s no need to be mean,” Cassandra’s boss. “You’re one to talk, though. You two are trying to steal company secrets and sell them to Luthor Corp. You think you’re sneaky, but I’m hear to tell you, I know everything,” he stressed the word into six syllables, “you two are doing.”
It was not!Tim’s turn to talk. He didn’t growl. He let out a condescending snort. “Steal secrets? You’re kidding right. We’re here to burn this company to the ground.”
“‘Pfft,’ I say,” Cassandra’s boss said.
“Two more minutes in your office and this whole company would be a memory,” Betty told him.
“Is that so?” A pair of hands landed on Betty and not!Tim’s shoulders. The pair belonged to one man, who stood right behind him. Both teens turned to look at the speaker, their eyes growing wide when they saw who it was.
Bruce Wayne glared at the duo. “You did the right thing, Cassandra,” he said. Behind Wayne, Cassandra and a pair of security guards stepped into view. “Officers, would you please…Oops!”
Seeing their jig was up, not!Tim and Betty tried to make a break for it. Before he could get more than a step away, not!Tim found himself the victim Bruce Wayne’s world famous clumsiness. He tripped and face-planted hard enough into the wall to knock himself out.
Betty didn’t fair much better. Three steps into her flight, her feet flew out from beneath her. She hit the floor right in front of the security guards, he snapped a pair of cuffs around her wrists before picking her up off the ground.
“Hey, Cassandra, I found your Jam Box!” Cassandra’s boss called out. He triumphantly held up the spherical, plastic MP3 player. “Weren’t you looking for this?”
Non-Canon Interlude
*ring*
*ring*
“I.T. department, Cassandra Cain speaking, please state the nature of your problem.”
“Yes, I’m calling from accounting, I just send you an email.”
“Ok.”
“Have you recieved it yet?”
“Yes. In my inbox.”
“Oh, good, because my toner cartridge was running low, and I was hoping someone from your department could come fix it.”
“Says that in the email.”
“Right.”
“Then why did you call?”
“It just wanted to be sure it got there.”
*click*
*type*
*type*
*type*
*click*
*beep* *deep* *doop* *bloop*
“Uh, um, hello, accounting.”
“Did you you get my email?”
“What? Who is this?”
“Cassandra Cain, I.T. department.”
“Um, no. I don’t think– What the?! My computer just started smoking.”
“Oh, good. You did get my email!”
*click*
PART TWELVE: Hostage Crisis (on at least one Earth)
Tim Drake was not a blonde. At least the Tim Drake she knew wasn’t a blonde, he had dark, jet-black hair that always stayed neatly combed when he was Tim Drake, but somehow always stayed ruffled when he was Robin. Cass always meant to ask him about that, because it was kind of funny. However, two things were stopping her at the moment.
The first reason was that obviously this was not Tim Drake. Sure, he looked like Tim Drake — except for the hair — but he didn’t move like Tim Drake. Whoever the look-a-like was, he moved with a much more sinister gait. His muscles were always tensed, ready to lash out if needed. He wasn’t as aware of everything as Tim was, he was only aware of people.
So, it wouldn’t have done much good to ask him about the hair thing.
The second reason Cass didn’t ask was simply because she couldn’t ask him. Two rolls of duct tape around the wrists, ankles, waist, chest, and mouth pretty much cut off all forms of legible conversation. She could wave her hands at the not!Tim, but that wouldn’t go very far getting answers about real!Tim’s hair.
Cass sighed and studied the chair to which she was taped.
“Don’t even thought about trying to get out,” not!Tim growled. He peered out of the supply closet one last time, then pushed the door shut. “That paralytic’s good for at least another hour, and that’s an hour even for you.” He stepped up right in front of Cass, and looked down at her. “I know about you, Miss Super-Ninja, and I took that into account when I doped those lemon squares.”
Cass chastised herself inwardly. She knew better than to take snacks from Betty Kane, even really delicious lemon squares that were left on her desk with an apology taped to them. It was the oldest trick in the book, and she had fallen for it.
The only thing that eased her conscience was the fact that those were really good lemon bars. As soon as she escaped, beat up not!Tim, and knocked out Betty’s teeth, she was going to ask for the recipe. She wagered that Alfred would be willing to help her fix another batch is she asked nicely.
A small knock on the door caught not!Tim’s attention. He backed up and opened it a crack. After seeing who was on the other side, he stepped back enough to allow them to come in the makeshift dungeon.
Cass rolled her eyes as Betty Kane stepped into the room. Of course it would be her. Cass suddenly wished she could take her gag off; if she couldn’t ask not!Tim about real!Tim’s hair, then at least she could get Betty’s recipe. Cass grunted as loud as she could and nodded at Betty.
“Oh,” Betty purred, “don’t be upset, Cass. This isn’t anything personal,” she cooed, “just business.” Cass grunted again, trying to bring her face and fingers together to pull the gag off. “Geez, Cass,” Betty snapped, “You don’t have to go crazy.”
Cass sighed. Teeth kicking first, then she would get the recipe. Apparently that was how it was going to go down. She could live with that.
“Is he gone?” not!Tim asked.
Betty nodded. “I told him that Cass was on the seventh floor, and he took off after her. I took all the toner out of those printers this morning, so he’ll be up there for hours fixing thing.”
not!Tim rubbed his hands together, and whispered, “Excellent, Betty.” He turned to the closet door, and added, “Then let’s go!”
“Hold up,” Betty said. She grabbed not!Tim’s shoulder and pulled him back. “We can’t leave her here,” Betty said, pointing at Cass. “She’s psycho-crazy.”
“The lemon bars–”
“No way,” Betty shook her head, “I don’t care what you say; we’re not leaving her.”
not!Tim sighed. “Fine,” he relented, “Keep watch in the hall, I’ll carry her.” She moved around behind Cass’s chair, bent slightly at the knees, and slid his hands beneath the seat. With a quick, upward movement, not!Tim lifted Cass off the ground. “Come on,” he grunted at Betty.
She nodded and opened to door. The trio moved swiftly from the supply closet, past Cass’s desk, and thanks to a borrowed set of keys from her top drawer, into Cass’s boss’s office. As they passed the threshold into his office, not!Tim stumbled slightly. He managed to recover his balance, but not before dropping Cass onto the floor. The forward momentum, combined with the front-right leg of her chair getting caught on the carpet, tipped the chair and Cass over onto their side.
“You okay, Timmy-pooh?” Betty asked not!Tim.
He brushed himself off. “Yeah, fine,” he grunted.
Betty looked down at Cass and smiled, “Any bumps, Cass?” Cass merely glared back up at Betty. “Guess not,” Betty chirped.
While Betty grinned like an idiot at Cass, not!Tim made his way over to Cass’s boss’s computer. He stopped to look at the desk where he was about to sit down. The top of it was littered with action figures, old handheld computers, and empty Soder bottles. not!Tim looked up at Betty and asked, “Are you sure this is the computer Owlman told us to hack?” he asked.
Betty nodded. “He said this guy was the keystone to taking down Wayne,” Betty told not!Tim, “that if we could get into this guy’s systems, we could shut down Batman’s corporate weaponry.”
not!Tim shrugged. “Corporate weaponry,” he parroted. “If Owlman thinks taking down Batman’s business will work, who am I to argue?” He reached into his pocket, and began fumbling around.
Betty slinked up to the desk, and leaned across. “Why, you’re Timothy Drake,” she said slyly, “you’re Night Owl!” not!Tim leaned over and the two shared a rather steamy, if not disgusting from Cass’s angle, kiss. “You’re the guy Owlman’s going to owe a huge favor to once this works.”
not!Tim finally dragged his hang out of his pocket, bringing out a boxy device along with him. “And you,” not!Tim murmured as he plugged the device into the workstation, “are Owl-Girl, the hot mama who’s going to be there to share it with me.”
The two of them snickered for a moment before settling down. not!Tim relaxed in Cass’s boss’s chair, and Betty perched on the edge of his desk. After a minute of watching Cass, Betty hopped off the desk. She moved over to Cass, kneeling down next to her.
“I bet you’re just full of questions, aren’t you, Cass?” Betty asked. Cass nodded as hard as she could. “Promise you won’t scream if I take this off?” Cass started to shake her head, promising; he she shook her head, saying she wouldn’t scream. Somewhere in the back of her mind, Cass realized the irony of her having a hard time communicating because she wasn’t able to talk.
Betty seemed to take the nod-shaking as Cass intended it, because she reached down and snatched the tape from Cass’s mouth. “That better?” Betty asked. Cass nodded.
“So, you want to know who we are?” Betty asked proudly.
Cass shook her head, “Nope.”
“Oh,” Betty mumbled, “You want to know what we’re doing here then?”
“No,” Cass told her.
“Where we’re from?” not!Tim asked from across the room.
“Don’t care,” Cass said flatly.
Cass’s apathy seemed to irritate not!Tim, because he stood up from his seat and walked over to her. Betty stood up, she they were both looking down at Cass. “Then what do you want to know?” Betty asked.
Cass simply asked, “What’s the recipe for your lemon bars?”
PART ELEVEN: Zhamboks
“A gift for you!” Starfire cheered.
In her hands, Starfire held a smallish, black orb. The nearly featureless orb was only marred from being perfectly smooth because of two blinking lights and hole at the top of it. Otherwise, Starfire’s gift could have easily been mistaken for an over-sized marble.
Nightwing beamed back. “Star, this is awesome!” he replied. “You have no idea just how long I’ve wanted one of these.”
Starfire clapped in delight. “Oh, yes,” she nodded, still grinning, “the hints were many. I just hope you do not already have one.”
“No, no,” Nightwing answered. “I promise, I don’t have one of these.” He paused to look at the orb. “One small question,” he asked, “what’s its name?”
Starfire nodded. “On Tamara, we call them Zhamboks.”
“Zhamboks,” Nightwing nodded. “This is awesome. Thank you!”
~~~
“Got a present for you,” Dick Grayson said. He snuck loudly into Oracle’s work room. Barbara turned to look over her shoulder at him. “Catch.” He lobbed something black at her.
Her hand deftly snagged the flying, black object from the sky. “And this would be?” she asked. Barbara turned the black orb over in her hands, examining it.
“Tamaranian,” Dick answered.
“It’s a little small to be a Tamaranian,” Barbara replied with an added dose of smarminess for good measure. “And, not that I have a photographic memory or anything, but I seem to remember the people of Tamara being more orange than glossy black.”
Dick blew a small raspberry. “Its Tamaranian technology,” he amended. “Called a Zhamboks. I figured everyone should have a Zhamboks.”
“Okay,” Barbara replied slowly, “well, what does a Zhamboks do?”
Dick gasped. “Does the all-knowing, all-seeing Oracle finally admit to not knowing something?” he asked incredulously. “Has the impenetrable fortress of Oracle at last been, well, penetrated?” His grin was too big to be real.
Barbara rolled her eyes. “You don’t know, do you?”
Dick’s grin fell. “No,” he admitted. “Starfire gave it to me,” he explained, “She said I’d been dropping hints about it, and seemed so happy–”
“When doesn’t she seem happy?” Barbara asked rhetorically.
“–I didn’t have the heart to let her down.” Dick looked somewhere between genuinely distressed and honestly penitent. “I asked Cyborg and Beast Boy, but they didn’t know either. Cyborg offered to find out, but…”
“You’d rather have a working Zhamboks you can’t use than a broken one that you could have?” she finished. Dick nodded. “Leave it with me,” she said. Her eyes closed to narrow slits before she continued. “The Oracle does know all, does see all, and has a Rolodex of engineers who ensure she keeps that reputation!”
“Sorry, Babs,” Ted Kord said, “I have no idea.”
“No, Oracle,” Mister Terrific said, “I’m not sure what a Zhamboks is. If you ever want to get rid of it, though, I’d love to take it apart.”
All Batman said was, “Hnnn.”
“Can I have this?” Cassandra asked.
Barbara looked over at the latest Batgirl. Cassandra was holding the Zhamboks in her hand; she was also rolling it along her arm and across her shoulders. If the Zhamboks was nothing else, it could at least be an alien Hacky Sack.
“Technically, it belongs to Nightwing,” Barbara said aloud. What she didn’t say aloud was that he hadn’t bothered to check on it in over two months. “I’m still trying to figure out just what that Zhamboks is.” What she didn’t even consciously think was that the Zhamboks had been cluttering up her work area, rolling on the floor, and hiding itself under tables for two months. But it he wants it back,” she continued, “I’ll tell him you’re showing it to someone for me.”
Cassandra rolled the ball onto the back of her hand, and then launched it into the air. They watched as it flew into the air, reached its zenith, and began to fall back down. Cassandra snatched it from the air before it could hit the floor. In one, fluid motion, she not only caught the Zhamboks but also shoved it into her jacket pocket.
“Cool!” she replied.
The black ball from Barbara was wicked fun. It was perfectly weighted for tossing around. It was so smooth and hard that rolling it along anything equally hard made the coolest warble-grunt sound. She was amazed that Barbara didn’t know what it was for.
Cassandra pushed the black ball with her thumb and sent it rolling along her desk, toward a stack of whiteout bottles she’s borrowed from the supply closet. A row of pencils taped to her desk made sure the black ball didn’t roll away, which wasn’t too much of a concern, since she was pretty good at aiming it.
The black ball struck the whiteout bottles, knocking them offer. The momentum was enough to knock a couple of the bottles onto the floor, but not so much that the ball jumped the pencil taped to the edge of her desk.
“Strike!” Cassandra cried cheerfully.
A moment later, as she was picking up whiteout bottles and setting them back up, the door to her boss’s office popped open. He stuck his head out, and the rest of his body followed shortly. “You’re not on strike are you?” he asked, eyeing both Cassandra and her desk.
“Ha!” she chortled. “No, strike. You know,” she said. Cassandra showed him the black ball; it then proceeded to roll it across her desk. The ball bumped into one of the whiteout bottles. “Strike!”
“Oh,” he said. “I get it.” He nodded.
“Want to play?” she asked. She offered the black ball to him.
He shrugged. “I guess,” he said. He took the black ball from her hand, which left her free to reset her adhoc pins. While Cassandra worked, her boss began to examine the black ball. “Hey,” he asked, “is this a Jam Box?”
Cassandra looked at him. “Zhamboks,” she corrected him. “It’s called a Zhamboks.”
“No,” he said, “it’s a Jam Box.” Her boss reached into one of Cassandra’s drawers and pulled out a pair of headphones. He offered the ear buds to Cassandra, and proceeded to plug the jack into the hole atop the black ball. When Cassandra had the buds in her ears, he pressed one of the green lights. Immediately Cassandra’s face lit up as music began lightly chirping in her ears.
After a minute of listening to music, Cassandra pulled the ear buds out of her ears. “So, you going to bowl or what?” she asked.
PART TEN: It Takes Balls To Work Here
“We want the kind of mice without balls.”
Cassandra stared at the accountant from seventh, trying to figure out a way to answer his question that didn’t involve fists. In the end, she decided the truth was the best way to go. “Next month,” she said, “when you get your new computer.”
The accountant sighed. “Can’t you do anything before then?” he asked. “A month is a long time to wait. The people on fifth and sixth both have those new mice, and we’re all sure on seventh that ball-less mice would improve productivity.”
Cass wasn’t as well-versed as her boss was when it came to computer terms, but she didn’t need to understand all the complexities of “productivity” to see that he was lying to her.
If this accountant had not been the sixth person from his floor complaining about new mice, Cass probably wouldn’t have cared. If those six people hadn’t been scheduled to get brand new computers in a month, she would have let it go. He was the sixth person, though, and they were getting new computers. Enough was enough.
“Fine,” she grumbled, making a point to look at her own computer screen. Her minesweeper game was much more interesting than the accountant. “Go home. Ball-less mice tomorrow. No problem.” She cringed as her mouse clicked on a mine, ending her game.
“Wow, Cassandra,” he said, “you are the best!”
The accountant spun around on his heel and headed toward the elevators. He didn’t hear Cassandra say, “I know I am.” The irony probably wouldn’t have sunk in anyway.
*THUD*
“AAIUGH!” a pained voice cried out from somewhere near the elevators. It was followed by a less noisy moan, and the sound of a body standing back up. A second passed, and then another sound resonated down the hallway.
*THUD*
“AAIUUGGH!”
Cass somehow managed to keep from breaking out laughing as footsteps pounded toward her desk. His hand shot out to reveal several small, grey rubber balls in his palm. “What are these?” his angry voice growled.
“Mouse balls,” Cass answered flatly.
“Are these from the seventh floor? Did you take these from every computer mouse in the accounting department?”
Cass nodded. “Yes.”
“Why would you do that?” he choked, “Why would you take out all of our mouse balls, and then scatter them in front of the elevator?”
“To improve productivity,” she replied. Then Cass smiled coldly and added, “My productivity.”
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