Brian Saves the World, Maybe

Chapter 18 - Conspiracies

The next morning, Brian was sitting at his desk at work, when an email popped up. The subject read "URGENT!" Groaning, he opened it.

BRIAN:

MYSPACEBARISBROKEN
FIXIMMEDIATELY!!!

JACK

Apparently, his Caps Lock key was also broken. Brian sighed. He would have had Ralph handle this, but the guy had taken a few days off to go to a superhero convention.

Brian opened his desk drawer, and took out 3 jellybeans, putting them in his pocket. Then he grabbed a keyboard and began walking. He hated going to Jack's office, and not just because Jack was usually there. The primary reason was Bentley, Jack's dog.

Brian rounded the last corner, and, sure enough, there was Bentley, his fat body sprawled out in Jack's doorway, like a giant, immobile slug.

Bentley's habit of lying there was annoying, but the real problem was Bentley's habit of biting anyone that stepped over him. Nothing that would break the skin, just a lazy nip that could land you on your butt if you weren't careful.

Brian complained about it once, and Jack just gave him a I'm-surrounded-by-idiots look, and said, "Come on, Brian! You have to give him something. He likes jellybeans."

Since then, Brian always kept a stock of them in his desk drawer, just in case. The tactic had worked well (aside from the time Ralph had eaten all his jellybeans).

Nearing the office, Brian could see that it was vacant. Jack must have been in a meeting or something. Bentley eyed him suspiciously as he approached. Taking a jellybean from his pocket, Brian carefully held it out to the dog.

Bentley sniffed at it, then lazily took it in his mouth and swallowed it, without chewing. Stupid dog, Brian thought, stepping over him.

Brian picked up the broken keyboard and examined it. The space bar wouldn't move at all, as if something were stuck underneath. He tried prying it off with his pocketknife, but it wouldn't budge, so he applied more pressure. And just like that, the space bar sprang off, landing in an office plant beside Jack's desk.

There was the problem. A paperclip had gotten stuck underneath.

Brian stooped next to the office plant where the space bar had flown. As he searched through the thick leaves of the artificial plant, his hand met something small and metallic. He pulled it out and looked closely at it. It was about the size of a coin, but thicker, and it had what appeared to be a small antenna sticking out of it. It was a bug!

Brian scratched his head. Why would someone want to spy on Jack?

He was still thinking about this on the way to the Talon security office when his phone vibrated. He stopped to fish the phone out of his pocket.

It was a text from Dale: "I fixed the can opener last night. Try it this evening."

Brian stared at the message for a moment, puzzled.

Frowning, he texted back: "Will do. Thx."

As Brian put the phone back in his pocket, something smacked into his foot, and he heard a small voice say "Excuse me!"

He looked down. It was a little robotic vacuum cleaner with a sticker on it that said, "Thor."

Thor ran into Brian's foot, backed up, and ran into his foot again. "Excuse me! Excuse me!" Stooping, he picked it up.

Talon had begun working on the robotic vacuums the previous year, and Jack had had the brilliant idea of downsizing the janitorial department in favor of 30 of the prototype vacuums. The little devils were always breaking down (especially Thor), and since they had wires, Jack expected Brian to repair them. Jessica had suggested naming the things, to help keep track of them, and Ralph had picked out the names.

Brian took Thor back to his office, deciding to report the security breach later.

At lunch, Brian mentioned the bug to Dale.

"A bug in Jack's office. . . Interesting," Dale said, folding his hands on the table and nodding sagely.

"Weird, right? I'll turn it in to Security this afternoon."

"What? You can't give that to Security! What if it was planted by Observers?" Dale was speaking in a hoarse whisper, now.

Brian looked at him with a blank expression. "Not all problems have to do with Observers. Why not let the security department handle it?"

Dale put his hands flat on the table and leaned forward. "That doesn't mean Observers aren't involved in this. And someone from Security could be in on it too! Let me take a look at it, first. I know something about these kinds of devices."

Brian smirked. "Of course you do."

"Look, If I don't get anywhere with it, I'll take it to Security myself."

That sounds like a reasonable plan to me.

Brian sighed. "Sure, whatever." He pulled the bug out of his pocket and passed it over to Dale.

Dale stashed it somewhere in his jacket, casually looking around to make sure no one was watching. Brian figured he was going into full Dale stealth mode, now.

Then Brian remembered Dale's strange text from earlier. "Hey, what was that about a can opener?"

He leaned in. "That was code for the phone. Texting isn't secure," he said in the same, strained whisper.

Oh, right, Brian thought. Dale had already been in full stealth mode.

Dale seems to be a very sensible person.

Yeah, perfect word for him.

After work, Dale waved Brian over to his van and handed him a black canvas bag.

It looked a bit like a laundry bag. Brian peered at it, raising an eyebrow. "Um, thanks." He started to open it.

"Not here!" Dale rasped. "When you get home."

Brian looked at him, dead-faced. "Right, okay. Sure."

The moment he was inside his car, Brian opened up the bag and peeked inside. It was the red phone. Dale had attached it to a football helmet with several layers of duct tape. It appeared he had cut out a portion of the helmet so the phone could reach his ear, and had removed the face mask. Brian scratched his head. This is going interesting, he thought.

That evening, Dale came over to have Brian try out the helmet.

Dale, what have you done? Brian thought, as he plopped the helmet on. The thing was heavy, and leaning just a little one way or another sent his head slumping to that side. "Exactly how many pounds of tape did you put on this?" he asked, frowning.

Dale ignored the question. "How does it feel?"

"Like I have a trash can on my head. It might save my arm, but my neck would pay the price. Sorry Dale, but I don't think it's going to work. I appreciate the effort. I know you put a lot of... duct tape into it."

Dale scowled. "I'll see what I can do."