He’d opted for the stairs today because the elevator groaned yesterday and he didn’t want to be crushed between steel and cosmic horror before lunch. A noble plan—if the stairwell didn’t seem to have last been cleaned back when dinosaurs still roamed.
A thick coat of dust had settled over every railing, each step he took puffing little clouds up around his boots. After the fourth flight, he gave in and lowered the goggles from his hat.
He reached the bottom, pulled his coat tighter, and muttered, “Didn’t think I’d need PPE to go to HR.”
The corridor was, again, completely silent. The flickering lights, the damp stains on the concrete, the ever-present scent of mildly electrical rot—yep. Still here.
Halden checked his phone out of habit. No service. No bars. Just a cheery little "X" and his battery draining itself out of mercy.
He’d spent last night googling “Wraith & Co”, trying to find out if he was part of a scam, a cult, or a government experiment. Maybe all three.
Nothing came up. Not a single hit. It was like the company didn’t exist, or didn’t want to.
Very illegal.
Very suspicious.
Very Tuesday.
Back at his desk, the lightbulb flickered to life, terminal already humming. Halden sat down, dusted off his gloves, and sighed.
The screen blinked at him.
> GOOD MORNING, HALDEN.
> SLEEP WELL? (Rhetorical. We already know.)
“Creepy already. Cool. Carry on,” Halden murmured.
> WELCOME BACK TO YOUR SAFE AND ENTIRELY MANDATORY WORK ENVIRONMENT.
> LET’S DIVE INTO TODAY’S OBJECTIVE.
RECRUITMENT PROFILE #0002
TODAY’S TARGET CANDIDATES: MONSTERS WITH STRONG MENTAL FORTITUDE
PREFERRED ATTRIBUTES:
— Unshakable composure under stress
— Resistance to mind-altering stimuli
— Ability to communicate through unconventional means
— High information retention
— Obedient, or at least... persuadable
NOTE:
We are not seeking empaths. We tried that. It ended poorly.
WARNING:
Candidates may attempt minor reality warping. Do not make eye contact longer than 3.7 seconds.
Please refer to tip sheet [SURV-PSYCH-007] before interviews.
(Tip sheet has been lost. Possibly eaten.)
GOOD LUCK, HALDEN!
WRAITH & CO. — HARVESTING POTENTIAL, EVEN IF IT'S THE END OF YOU
The screen flashed off.
Halden leaned back in his chair and pinched the bridge of his nose. “Okay. Okay. So. Just mentally invulnerable, borderline incomprehensible, possibly dangerous reality-warping monsters.
Cool. Love it.
Great second day.”
He exhaled slowly, pulled out a little notebook from his coat pocket, and scribbled:
To Buy /
-
New gloves (preferably lead-lined)
-
Second pair of goggles??
-
Snacks
Just then, the door clicked. Halden straightened. The goggles stayed on.
Interview #003 - Greg
The door opened, but nobody walked in.
Halden waited. Blinked. Checked the terminal.
Nothing.
Then a faint creaking sound came from the floor, like something was stepping on the tiles. Something very light. Something very... uh...smelly.
The smell hit him fast—sharp and unmistakable. Garlic. Burnt garlic. Burnt garlic in a musty linen closet.
Halden sat up straighter. “Hello?”
There was a pause. Then:
“Oh, hey! You must be the new guy. Halden, right? Nice gloves.”
The voice came from about two feet in front of the desk, disembodied but cheerful. It had a slight echo, like it was talking through a cave.
“...Yes,” Halden said slowly, “I am the new guy. You are...?”
“Oh, right, yeah. Name’s Greg.”
Another pause.
“Well, not really. My actual name is like, twelve syllables and probably illegal to pronounce in this dimension, so Greg is easier. I think I used to be something else. Maybe a fog thingy? Memory's weird.”
Halden stared at where the voice came from. There was absolutely nothing visible. Not even a shimmer. Just the lingering scent of garlic and the faint creaking of floorboards.
Greg continued casually. “Anyway, good to finally meet someone here! I’ve been showing up for a while now. Real proactive. You guys haven’t even paid me yet, but I thought I’d earn some brownie points, you know?”
Halden frowned. “You’re not officially hired.”
Greg laughed. “Oh. Classic Greg moment.”
“Right... Okay, Greg.” Halden flipped open his notes and did his best impression of someone who knew what the hell they were doing. Which, of course, he did not. “Let’s just go through a few questions based on your... potential fit.”
“Ohhh, like a real interview? Fun!”
“Sort of. So... do you have experience working under extreme mental pressure?”
Greg was silent for a moment. “Define 'pressure.' I mean, I've uh...worked retail before. I think that counts?”
“Uh-huh.” Halden scribbled something down. “How about information retention? Say, in data-heavy scenarios?”
“Oh, sure. I remember everything I’ve ever seen, smelled, heard, touched—except names. And my death. That’s blank. Dunno why.”
Halden blinked. “Right. Do you communicate well under stress?”
“Well, you tell me, eh?” Greg chuckled. “Nah, I’m good. I mostly talk to myself. But I’m great with group dynamics. Just not great in groups. Because of the whole...invisble thing.”
“Mhm,” Halden said. “Last one—any reality-bending tendencies?”
There was an awkward pause.
“Well, uh. I mean. Depends. Does making coffee mugs randomly vanishing count?”
“Yes.”
“Oh. Then no. Definitely not.”
Silence insued for a second. Halden sighed. Deeply.
Halden looked at the spot where Greg presumably stood. “You’re not unionized, are you?”
“Absolutely not. I barely exist.”
“Great.”
Greg gave a proud, invisible huff. “So! Am I in? Or do I need to fill out a form? Because I tried to grab one last time but my hand went through the paper.”
“You have hands?”
“Metaphorically. And spiritually.”
Halden just stared at his notepad. This was insane. But Greg was kind of qualified. Sort of. Maybe. Not...totally, but...well, enough.
“I’ll send my notes to the terminal,” he said finally. "You can go while I decide. They'll contact you soon."
Greg cheered, which echoed off the concrete like someone dropped a choir down a well. “Woo! You’re doing great, by the way. I’d say ‘see you around’ but—well, you know.”
And just like that, the scent of garlic faded. The room was silent again.
It took a few minutes of intense deliberation (and doodling), before Halden finally settled, pressing the accept button.
The terminal dinged. Halden barely had the time to read the terminal.
The door clicked again.
Interview #004 - Pleth the Mossman
The door groaned.
Not creaked. Groaned.
Like it was about to apologize for what was coming through it.
On second thought, it really should have.
Halden looked up just in time to see a mass of moss, rock, and slow-moving...dread, ooze its way under the frame. The air grew damp immediately. Pollen drifted. A few of the ceiling tiles above his desk sagged. The thing was... towering. Broad as a freezer, tall as the ceiling allowed, with glowing yellow eyes blinking out of a face that, to be frank, was just a boulder.
Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation.
It squelched. It dragged. It also really smelled like a forgotten cave.
“...Good morning,” Halden said. He’d already lifted his scarf over his mouth. His goggles were fogged, and spores were visibly collecting on the desk. “Please take a seat.”
“We shall stand,” the creature rumbled, in a voice like mulch mixed with white noise. “Pleth is many. Pleth takes up space.”
“That you do,” Halden muttered, brushing off his notes and trying not to breathe in whatever was now gently falling on everything he owned. “Alright then... let’s start with a few questions to assess fit for today’s profile.”
Pleth’s glowing eyes blinked, non-synchronously. A small fern poked out from its collarbone and waved slightly.
Halden cleared his throat. “Today’s target candidates require strong mental fortitude, stability under stress, and versatility in hostile environments. Do you consider yourself...um... yourselves... to possess those qualities?”
“We thrive in adversity,” Pleth hummed. “We grew from rot and ruin. Storms nourish us. Lightning teaches us.”
“...Good, great,” Halden said, scribbling 'possibly metaphorical answer?' “And how do you handle high-pressure situations—emotionally and physically?”
Pleth leaned closer, moss pattering down like snow from its shoulders.
“Pressure grows diamonds,” it whispered. “We eat diamonds.”
“Okay,” Halden said, visibly recoiling. “Next—communication skills. This is a collaborative workplace. The ability to coordinate, receive instructions, and give feedback is essential.”
“Pleth is feedback,” the moss-thing said. “Pleth is many voices, woven tight. Teamwork is sacred. We enjoy... trust falls.”
There was a silence. An awful silence, actually.
“I’m sorry, you what?”
“We do not fall alone,” Pleth clarified. “We fall together. Into each other. Into the roots. Into unity.”
Halden couldn’t tell if that was inspiring or terrifying.
Honestly it was both.
“Right. Right. That’s very... corporate. Of you.” He tapped his pen against the pad, avoiding eye contact with one of the spores now sprouting a tiny mushroom on the corner of his desk. “Let’s um...pivot. How are you in modular roles? Say the company needs you to shift between departments, tasks, or realities.”
Pleth paused.
There was a low creaking from within its core.
“We move slow,” Pleth admitted. “We learn with patience. Some roots are deep. Some cannot be pulled.”
“Hmm.” Halden took that down. “Would you describe yourselves as adaptable? Just asking.”
Pleth looked at him.
“We endure. That is more than adapt.”
“...Fair.”
Outside, something skittered past the door with too many legs.
Inside, Halden considered if hiring a giant philosophical compost pile was something the company would reward or punish.
He wasn’t sure yet.
Halden clicked his pen.
The mushroom growing on his desk was now approximately the size of a desk lamp. He turned the page of his notes, trying not to smudge the spore stains, and looked up at Pleth, who hadn’t moved an inch...except of course for the constant, gentle shedding of moss and fungus.
“Alright,” Halden began, keeping his voice level and eyes slightly narrowed behind the goggles, “let’s continue. So, my next questions may sound a bit redundant, don't mind it... How do you usually respond to... tense or hostile situations? Aside from. You know. Eating diamonds. Or something.”
Pleth rippled.
A few stones tumbled off its shoulder and hit the floor with a dull thunk.
“We do not tremble,” Pleth said. “We have felt the scream of wildfire, the gnaw of termites, the cold collapse of civilizations. We remained. Even now, we spread.”
“Cool,” Halden muttered. “So, you’re very emotionally stable.”
“We do not possess emotion as your kind defines it,” Pleth rumbled. “We are not anxious. We are not joyful. We are not afraid.”
Halden scribbled:
'note: literally a hive, possibly incapable of fear. or joy. or taxes.'
Then paused.
“Next. Would you consider yourselves resistant to... mind-altering stimuli? Hallucinogens, manipulation, telepathy, memes, eldritch concepts, things of that nature.”
“We consume rot,” Pleth said. “We laugh at spores meant to control us. We sing with fungi that whisper backwards.”
Halden blinked slowly. “That’s a yes?”
Pleth oozed smugly, if that was possible.
“...Moving on,” Halden said, “How do you feel about communicating through unconventional means? Symbols, pheromones, dream logic, scent-marking, cursed dialects...”
“We prefer such means,” Pleth said. “Speech is for surface things. Real meaning lies deeper.”
“Wonderful,” Halden said flatly, tapping his pen. “So very legally usable.”
A long pause.
Halden looked again at the profile.
“High information retention. Can you follow complex instruction sets, and retain large quantities of data for extended periods of time?”
Pleth didn’t respond for a long moment. One of the glowing yellow eyes rotated slowly.
“We remember many things,” it said finally. “The story of ash. The hunger of rivers. The fall of kings.”
“That’s nice,” Halden said, “but can you remember ten-digit codes, or the layout of a factory?”
“We remember the sky before color.”
“Okay,” Halden said, with a pained smile, “but not blueprints. Noted.”
Finally, he leaned forward a little, pen hovering over the line marked Persuadability.
“Last question. And I want you to be honest with me, alright?”
Pleth leaned slightly closer. The air grew heavier.
“If instructed to do something you strongly disagreed with,” Halden asked, “something possibly against your instincts, would you comply? For the greater good of the company?”
There was a long pause.
“We do not disobey,” Pleth said slowly. “We simply become elsewhere.”
Halden stared.
“We respect no chain that does not feed the roots,” Pleth added. “No voice that does not carry rain. Commands without nourishment are not commands. They are noise.”
Halden sighed, uncapped a red pen, and circled a big ugly X on the corner of the page.
“Alright, Pleth. Thank you for your time. We’ll be in touch.”
“We shall not wait,” Pleth said gently. “Waiting is for brittle things.”
Then it shuffled slowly, shedding moss and silence alike, back through the door.
Another puff of spores drifted onto Halden’s chair.
He took off his goggles, rubbed his temples, and stared at the growing mushroom on his desk.
"Of course it's unionized," he muttered.
Halden pressed the "deny" button under the desk.
No reaction from the terminal.
Interview #005 - Swarm. Just Swarm.
The door creaked open. Really creaked this time.
Halden instinctively leaned back, unsure of what he was seeing. The figure that entered was roughly humanoid in shape, but oddly uneven. The long coat swayed too much, the hat tilted like it was balancing on shifting gravel, and the smell that followed was... um. Weird.
Then he heard the buzzing.
Hundreds of itty-bitty wings vibrating in a low chorus. A dozen pairs of legs under the coat worked in asynchronous rhythms. One gloved hand raised and waved jerkily.
“Hello!” came a voice. Scratchy. Tinny. Artificial?
“...Hi,” Halden replied, blinking. “You must be...?”
The figure tipped its hat. “Swarm. Just Swarm.”
Halden stared a little longer. The illusion was so, so bad, and yet here it was, trying.
Swarm sat. The chair creaked.
Several small beetles fell out of the bottom of the coat, scrambled back up, and vanished beneath the fabric. Halden chose to pretend he hadn’t seen that.
“Well,” he said, flipping to a new page, “let’s get started.”
“Please,” Swarm said. “We are delighted to be here. Big fans of corporate infrastructure. Big, big fans.”
Halden raised an eyebrow.
“...Right. Today’s profile is focused on candidates with strong mental fortitude and resistance to mind-altering influences. How would you rate yourself in that category?”
Swarm’s coat wriggled.
“Extremely stable,” said the voice. “We have eliminated all dissenting thoughts within the collective. Democracy takes too long.”
Halden blinked. “You mean… you have one mind?”
There was a pause.
“...Approximately seventy thousand minds. But we’ve agreed on some key bullet points.”
“Such as?”
“1. Job stability.
2. Sugar.
3. Avoiding vacuums.”
Halden scribbled down 'collective organism, but motivated. possibly insane. very anti-vacuum.'
He cleared his throat. “How about communication? Do you function in nonverbal or alternative languages?”
The coat shuffled.
“We have learned Morse. Semaphore. Light patterns. Vibration. Fungus-based sigils. The Twitter algorithm.”
“That last one’s not a language.”
“It used to be.”
“...Okay. How about retention? Are you able to store and recall complex information?”
“Absolutely,” said Swarm. “Each member of our body is a storage node. We can remember entire books. Or your lunch from last week.”
Halden’s pen paused mid-scratch.
Swarm clicked once, like a chittering chuckle.
“We were joking,” it added. “Mostly.”
Halden sighed. He rubbed his eyes. “Right, okay. Let’s... we’ll take a short pause before I move to the rest of the questions.”
“Of course!” said Swarm, enthusiastically. “We’ll just do some light internal voting in the meantime.”
The coat twitched violently. Several moths escaped the collar.
Halden leaned back.
He wasn’t sure if he was going to laugh, cry, or call an exterminator.
Halden exhaled slowly. Deep breath in. Deep breath out.
It’s fine. It’s fine. Bugs are normal. Bugs in a coat? …Still normal, if you just don’t think about it too much.
He leaned forward again, pen in hand. “Alright, Swarm. Let’s talk about persuasion.”
The coat shifted.
“Oh, we’re very open to it,” the voice said, bright and enthusiastic. “We respond extremely well to clear incentives. Honey. Heat lamps. Teeth.”
“Teeth?”
The coat stilled for a moment. “…We just like the idea of it.”
Halden wrote down amenable to persuasion – insectoid dental?
“How about obedience?” he asked, glancing briefly at the terminal’s listed traits. “How well do you follow orders?”
“Extremely well,” said Swarm. “We operate on a sophisticated command structure. Orders are disseminated, prioritized, and executed simultaneously by the swarm.”
A pause.
“…We do have one issue with bureaucracy,” they added. “It’s very hard to sign paperwork.”
“I can imagine,” Halden muttered.
“Do you need a signature?” the swarm asked.
“Well, usually—”
A mass of beetles and flies immediately spilled out of the coat’s left sleeve, forming into something vaguely hand-shaped. It twitched once, then raised a single chitinous...um...finger.
Halden jerked backward in his chair. Hard to blame him.
The hand dissolved.
“…You know what,” he said. “We’ll figure something out.”
Swarm gave a pleased rustle.
Halden ran through the rest of the checklist—problem-solving skills, adaptability, workspace requirements. Every answer came quickly, directly, and in slightly off-kilter corporate speak.
“Teamwork?”
“Mandatory. We are a team.”
“Composure under stress?”
“Excellent, unless someone brings out bug spray.”
“I’m not even gonna ask.”
By the end of the interview, Halden had a page full of notes, many of which simply said things like “???”, “do not touch,” and “god help the janitor.”
He stood.
“Alright, Swarm,” he said, clearing his throat. “We’ll… be in touch. The company will review your profile and—”
“Wonderful!” The coat flapped. “We’ll remain on standby in the vents.”
“…Please don’t.”
Swarm tipped their hat.
And then, without warning, the entire coat collapsed to the floor like a deflated balloon. Countless tiny bugs scattered, slipping into cracks in the walls and ceiling, leaving only the hat behind.
Halden stood still.
“Okay,” he muttered. “That’s fine. That’s probably normal. Aha.”
He looked down at the hat. A single cricket poked out from underneath, gave a little wave, and darted off.
Halden picked up the hat and tossed it in the trash.
“Third one today,” he muttered, returning to his desk.
He hesitated for a while, but ended up accepting this profile.
Because bugs definitely couldn't harm his already crumbling existance. Right?
The terminal buzzed softly.
> END OF DAILY PROFILES.
> DAILY COMPLETION STATUS: SATISFACTORY.
> LETHAL GAS DISPENSAL: DEACTIVATED.
There was that same mechanical click above his head. Halden instinctively looked up at the ceiling vent.
This time… it was dripping.
Just a little.
Mossy. Probably from Pleth.
Halden wiped his temple with the back of his sleeve. “I am never bringing lunch in here.”
The terminal continued.
> CONGRATULATIONS ON YOUR SECOND DAY, INTERVIEWER HALDEN.
> YOU HAVE SUCCESSFULLY IDENTIFIED TWO POTENTIAL HIRES.
> YOUR DISCERNMENT IS NOTED.
> IT IS NOT UNUSUAL TO ENCOUNTER DISAPPOINTING CANDIDATES.
> PLEASE CONTINUE TO TRUST YOUR INTUITIONS AND AVOID SYMBIOTIC INFECTIONS.
Halden blinked. “That last part seems… oddly specific.”
> REMEMBER:
> HUMAN JUDGMENT IS VALUABLE.
> YOURS ESPECIALLY.
> DO NOT GET EATEN.
Another soft clunk from the desk. The same dull coin slid out, glinting with the W.R.A.I.T.H. logo on one side, and a steaming cup of “coffee” on the other.
Halden looked at it, then shook his head. “Nah. Not tonight.”
He pocketed the coin anyway. Just in case.
The hallway lights dimmed as he stepped out. The concrete corridors still hissed and groaned with unseen piping, old vents wheezing faintly in the distance. As he passed the small rec alcove, someone gave a panicked yelp and dropped a binder.
“Oh—! Sorry! Sorry—I didn’t see you there—! Don’t mind me—!”
Halden turned. It was Gregory, the werewolf from yesterday, crouched awkwardly behind a low table. He was surrounded by a tower of paperwork, multiple ledgers, a calculator that had seemingly exploded, and a small, shaking cup of herbal tea.
“I was just—uh—running simulations,” Gregory said, holding up a flash drive like it explained everything. Which it did not. “Fiscal trajectories, you know! End-of-quarter modeling! Also trying to remember which number is eight!”
Halden raised a brow. “Okay. Well. Good to see you’re settling in.”
“OH YES,” Gregory said, much too loudly. “Very welcoming place. I only cried once today. Twice if you count the part where the vending machine growled at me.”
“That’s probably normal here.”
“I thought so!”
They stood in silence for a moment. Gregory nervously reshuffled a stack of papers that were already perfectly aligned.
Halden gave a small nod. “Right. I’m heading out.”
“Of course! Of course! Enjoy the air! Do people still do that? Air?”
“Sometimes.”
Halden turned and walked away, boots echoing faintly down the corridor. Behind him, he heard Gregory muttering numbers and softly whimpering something about “liquidity ratios.”
The elevator door shuddered shut.
And Halden went home.