My feet hurt after standing for so long, easily around two hours by now. I would really like to lean against a wall just to take some of the weight off, but that's just not possible as long as I'm playing guard in full view of the cubicle farm. Since when did I become a guard you may ask? Ever since this morning, obviously.

I was accosted by the Supervisor not one minute after clocking in at Guild HQ this morning. Phoenix Guild had done a quick headcount of the casualties suffered during the Rift fiasco and it turned out that most of Combatant Department was either KIA or currently in the hospital. That left many of the less vital areas in the HQ building unguarded. The Supervisor, recognizing my superior skills at being statue during moments of crisis, seconded me to serve in a temporary position within Combatant Department. Before I could even say anything, he tosses me an armband displaying my new designation in the Guild.

Objections aren't allowed it seems.

My first assignment in this glorious new position is, of course, standing guard over the General Department itself. That's the reason why I've been spending rotating shifts standing at the main entrance of our office, staring at the elevators down the corridor. I was supposed to check the ID of anyone trying to get in, but let's be honest here, who in the world would want to break into General Department? Everyone who shows up in front of me works on this floor already.

"So, don't you need to pat me down or check my pass?" the guy standing in front of me asks.

"You just went to the washroom." I sigh, rolling my eyes, "Not five minutes ago."

"The previous guard was more thorough, just saying." the rando makes a complaint.

"We've been working in the same office for more than a year." I point out, keeping my patience.

"I could be carrying a weapon?" rando jabs his finger at me.

"That's what the metal detector is for." I make a vague gesture at the device behind me.

"Its not even turned on." rando snorts.

"Do you want me to turn it on?" I deadpan back.

"That would be helpful?" the rando keeps up the pressure.

My eye is suddenly drawn to a glint coming from one of rando's socks. Kind of like what happened in the Rift, an almost magnetic pull trying to attract my attention. I focus on the conversation instead, since rando keeps getting in my face.

"Are you going inside or not?" I grumble, folding my arms.

Rando makes a disgusted look at me before walking past. But before he can get too far, I grab the man by his wrist and yank him backward.

"Your shoes and socks." I rasp into rando's ear, "Take them off."

"What?" rando suddenly sounds alarmed, "No idea what you're talking about."

"Sure you don't." I shrug, continuing to shoot in the dark, "So let's keep things that way. Go back to the washroom and clean yourself up. Then we can forget this incident, OK?"

"Sure." rando scurries off with his head low, muttering softly, "Thanks."

That's the second time today. My perception has been acting weird ever since the Rift, and that's outside of the halos I've been seeing. Just before I left the apartment this morning, I was distracted by another of those glints in the corner of my eye. Turned out that it was the ball point pen I'd lost months ago. My senses seem to lock on to stuff that's either lost or hidden. That's why I baited the rando just now, I needed to check whether or not these glints were for real or merely hallucinations. I might not have found out what he was hiding, but my senses weren't lying. The rando was definitely trying to smuggle something into the office.

I might not be going crazy after all. What a relief.

Guild HQ was housed in a skyscraper, holding administrative offices, training rooms, dorms, an armory, processing facilities for crafting materials and an underground garage. Basically everything a Guild employee would need under one roof. Make that multiple roofs, actually. One tower would not have enough space for all this goodness, so once you get past the General Staff's floor, the building splits into five separate towers for the specialist departments and other amenities.

As for General Department, we spend our time literally laboring under the thumb of everyone else. Outside, the city center clocktower's bell tolls, marking the end of the working day.

"Let's go Everett." the Supervisor bursts out of the office with a line of staffers in tow, those guys vaguely recognizable as part of the recent botched expedition.

"We're heading to Boggs straight away?" I ask, walking alongside the Supervisor as our group makes its way to the elevator.

"Captain Latour isn't around," the Supervisor explains, "so those bums at the Combatant and Support Departments decided to skive off and start the party early."

Is that so? My ears prick up at this piece of news. Our group boards the elevator and it begins the descent down a transparent glass shaft, mounted on the exterior of the building.

"Where's Latour then?" I quiz, tapping against the lift's metal paneling.

"On leave, keeping Excelsior company in the hospital." the Supervisor comments, "So there's no one watching Combatant and Support Departments. At least until the guild cycles someone new over."

I breathe a sigh of relief. I'm still safe, at least for a little more time.

We hit the first floor and the elevator's doors open, revealing HQ's public atrium. Phoenix Guild maintains some stores here, selling Rift materials and Guild equipment to anyone who cares to pay. For most members of the public, their contact with stuff from the Rift would be limited to buying it from a Guild. So that meant setting up a classy shopping arcade something of a priority for Phoenix Guild.

"Hot damn, you see that, Everett?" the Supervisor points at a well coiffed young woman trying out a tiara in one of the stores.

"The girl?" I shrug in response.

"No, get your head out of the gutter." the Supervisor makes a snarky remark, "The tiara. Its forged out of diamonite. Diamonite that I'm sure was extracted from a Rift with these two hands."

"Oh." I say, not particularly interested in the observation.

"You know what your problem is, Everett?" the Supervisor scowls and takes on a hectoring tone, "You don't have pride in anything. Haven't you ever felt the joy knowing that your work built something?"

"I have pride." I scowl, hackles rising, "Plenty of it in fact. I just don't take pride in my need to work."

"Its a man's way of life, Everett." the Supervisor frowns disapprovingly, "Working, providing, building. If you can't accept that, you'll always remain unhappy. Don't say I didn't warn you."

"What makes you think I'm unhappy?" I grumble, "Don't act like you know me outside of the office."

"Do you have any hobbies outside of work?" the Supervisor asks, "And lying in bed surfing the interspace on your phone doesn't count."

"Uh, you just took out my main pastime." I fold my arms defensively.

"Any plans to get a better apartment, a car, anything like that?" the Supervisor presses the issue with me.

"I can afford all of that, I'm just not interested at the moment." I deny. That's actually true, I wanted to spend my time in the city laying low. Throwing cash about would get in the way of that.

"You're not part of any Guild sports teams or hobby clubs either." the Supervisor concludes.

"None of that proves I'm unhappy." I point out.

"No, but the fact that your face always looks like you had swallowed a gallon of prune juice does." the Supervisor says pointedly.

"So the real problem is with my face then?" I shake my head in exasperation.

"Like I said, you don't take pride in anything." the Supervisor explains, "Meaning you've lost interest in the future. Everyday is like the last for you isn't it, Everett? Work, eat, sleep, shit."

"Hnh. Maybe." I grunt, losing whatever interest I had in the conversation. The Supervisor couldn't be more wrong about me. I'm freaking out inside precisely because of my future. But if he has the wrong impression, that's fine too. It means that my keeping a low profile has been working.

Getting lectured is still irritating as hell though.

"This talk is for your own good, Everett." the Supervisor claps me on the shoulder, "You survived the Primal Ape, would be a shame to just fade away after that."

"Fading away." I mutter, "I'm actually seriously considering that as one of my options."

The Supervisor gives me a strange look, but I just make a gesture telling him not to mind me. Came a bit too close in giving an honest answer just now.

And with that our group silently heads out into the snowfall outside HQ.