Origin Point -18 Hours

“In what way do you see yourself being suited for this role, Ms Manford?” Victor Peterson asked from behind his desk.

The leggy blonde, Samantha, sat on the opposite side of the table, far closer than he had expected though he wasn’t complaining. Closer than expected, as the desk was smaller than he’d realised. Their knees were touching. The room’s lone piece of furniture hadn’t even been in the ‘office’ until thirty minutes before the interview; he’d brought it from home in the back of his car with the seats down. It had coffee mug rings and paint splatter. He didn’t see the cartoon of a penis scratched into the surface until the interview was already under way; it was now covered with Samantha’s resume.

“I think my previous experience would be a perfect fit for your business.”

She looked at her surroundings, a little concerned that she may be attacked by vermin at any moment, the warehouse in which her interview was taking place was not what she was expecting. Both interviewer and interviewee were still wearing their coats as it was colder inside than out.

“Don’t worry,” Victor said, picking up on her discomfort. “The building will be renovated before anyone new starts work here. Can you explain how your work at,” he checked the resume, careful to not re-reveal the childish graffiti, “InVogue Promotions might translate to the particle physics world?”

“Well, my boss always placed a lot of pressure on me to look good physically. Ugly people don’t sign as many clients. We had this girl called Sharon working with us one time, her ears were too large, she didn’t get any commission at all. She quit after a week.”

“Oh, poor Sharon,” Victor paused for a moment, then continued when he realised that Samantha wasn’t making a joke. “Not exactly what I meant by physics, though. We deal with the science of physics here. You didn’t research that before the interview? No? Not a problem. Why are you making the move away from modelling and promotions?”

“Well, the promotional work is only part time. I thought a little admin work might help ends meet. I searched online for gym and physical therapy work, this must have come up accidentally, maybe I misspelt something.”

“Maybe it could be a happy mistake as we might need an assistant to handle the paperwork, we’ll be busy with the physics.”

“What kind of physics?”

“We’re mainly concerned with quantum entanglement right now.”

“Sounds sexy.” She gave him a flirtatious smile.

Twenty-eight, medium build with brown eyes and thick, short brown hair, Victor would be what most consider as average looking, but with bucket loads of confidence, he had very little trouble in attracting the attentions of the opposite gender.

“I suppose it is. It’s all about connections and attraction. Do you know what a photon is?”

“Isn’t that what they shoot at each other in Star Wars?”

Victor winced a little at the confusion between two of his favourite intellectual properties. He fought back the compulsion to correct her on the particularities of Trek and Wars.

“Sorta. They’re tiny, tiny particles that make up radiation like light. We can pair two photons so that anything that happens to one of them happens to the other. Like soul mates. No matter how far apart they are, they react as a pair.”

“Sweet.”

“Isn’t it? We can use their connection to communicate, I could make a messaging device with one of the tiny couple inside, then place its soul mate inside another and give it to you. No matter where you went in the world, I would be able to send you messages. You wouldn’t need to worry about bars on your device, as we’d always have perfect reception. They’d only be able to talk to each other, so I’d be the only one in your address book, but I’d always be there for you. Connected. Even if you travelled to the other end of the universe.”

Samantha shook herself out of the transfixed state she’d unwittingly entered into while Victor stared into her eyes. “Is any of this even true? It sounds a little far-fetched.”

“It’s entirely factual. It will be a useful way of sending secure messages in future. Nothing would be transmitted over airwaves or through cables, so it’s virtually immune to interception. We’ll have much more interesting applications in mind, though.”

“I’m intrigued, what ways?”

“Well, I could tell you, but then I’d…”

There was a sudden thud from the door to the warehouse, quickly followed by a grunt that could be heard softly through the closed door, then another thud and the squeak of wood against wood as the door sprung open and a slightly plump man fell through the opening onto the warehouse floor.

“Shit, Simon, you okay, mate?” Victor asked with a smirk, he went to his friend and helped him to his feet.

“Fine thanks. That door’s the first thing we’re getting fixed when the cash starts flowing.” The tumbler said.

“There’s no point even having the door when there’s a man-sized hole in the brickwork of the west wall, might want to get that filled in first. I don’t know why you didn’t use it to get in here, it’s right in front of where you parked, Si.”

Victor had known Simon Raines for over ten years since they were in college together, but he was still surprised by Simon’s lack of common sense. Simon had a genius level intellect but spent so much time in his mind that he even bungled the things that should be achieved on autopilot. For people of Simon’s personality type this was by no means unusual, Victor knew, but it always amazed him to see Simon act like an archetypal cartoon science professor. Victor also had a much higher than average IQ, but he was glad he didn’t reach the point on the spectrum where he started to lose the instinctual functions that most human beings shared. He often thought that he should buy Simon a crash helmet and protective suit to prevent him getting seriously hurt by his lack of attention to his environment.

Simon straightened his thin mousey blonde hair, trying to regain some semblance of dignity after the fall, despite it being a mess even before the fall. “Who’s this?” he asked.

“Who?” Victor replied, failing to play dumb. “Oh, this is Samantha, I’m interviewing her for the admin position.”

“What admin position? We don’t even have paperwork to file, let alone anywhere to file it. Are you using that as an excuse to pick up women again.”

Victor quickly bustled Simon a few feet away from Samantha.

“Shh, Simon, that’s not what I’m doing... this time. Well... maybe a little, but I think we’ll need a female presence around the office, there’s too much testosterone flying around,” This was a blatant lie since both men knew neither of them was a testosterone flinger. “We need some oestrogen to even it out. This could be a disaster. You know how you get when you can’t do your morning sudoku.”

Simon rolled his eyes. “We have Spencer; she’s a girl. We can’t trust anyone with what we have here, Victor, you know that. Not a complete stranger, anyway.”

“Sam’s not a complete stranger, we were in the middle of an interview before you literally crashed it. That’s why we have interviews, Simon. Oh, and Spencer’s one of the boys. She’s even got a boy’s name for God’s sake.”

“It’s gender neutral.”

“Whatever,” Victor said, trying to shrug off Simon’s protests, before immediately resigning to them. “Well, maybe you’re right. She might be a distraction, I’d never get anything done. Might even have to fire myself for inappropriately flirting with the female staff.”

“I can still hear you. The echo in here’s pretty loud,” Samantha objected. “And I can reach out and touch you without leaving my seat.”

“Apologies, Miss Manford, no offence meant.”

“None taken. I probably wouldn’t report it anyway, hon.” She winked. “But it sounds like I wasted my time here since there’s no real position.”

“Don’t listen to him,” Victor said. “We’ll need someone no doubt. Simon hates paperwork, don’t you Simon?”

“The monotony relaxes me.”

“Shut up, Simon.”

“Don’t worry about it. You have my number on the application, maybe call me if you decide there is a position. Or even if there isn’t.” She smiled and turned to leave.

“You might want to use the west wall,” Simon said, “It’s closer to the car park.”

He pointed to the large gap, twenty or so feet to her right and she thanked him, heading out into the car park. Victor and Simon watched her leave.

“What was this one? Stripper?” Simon guessed.

“She sold cars. Why are you here anyway? I thought you were allergic to the mould.”

“I came to put some rat traps down. I’m more allergic to them.”

“Once we get that wall filled, we should get less.”

“I feel like I could catch something just breathing in the air here.”

“Yeah, next time an uncle dies and leaves you property, make sure you get them to make it more hospitable before they croak.”