the deleted, part 2

by fred flynn

part two of three

to read part one, click here

orville looked at the new message. the new message was - “you were warned”. orville immediately saved it and forwarded it to the contact he had tried before. as he pressed “send” it ocurrred to him that he could have sent it to a different threat/extortion line. there was no shortage of them. maybe some were more “official” than others. but it was too late. * the next afternoon, just before quitting time, he was summoned to the human resources office. it was the first time he had visited it since he had been hired five years earlier. he had never complained, or been complained about, or caused trouble. he recognized the woman from human resources. she looked exactly as he remembered her from five years before, and she had the same two pictures, of a cat and a dog, on her desk. two people orville had never seen before, a man and a woman, were also waiting for him. they were seated on hard chairs to the human resources woman’s right. the man wore a blue shirt with a white tie and looked like a wolf. the woman wore a light green shirt with a black bow tie and looked like a cat. there was a third hard chair in front of the human resources woman’s desk, and she pointed to it, and orville sat down on it. these people are from security, the human resources woman said to orville. they have a few questions to ask you. orville noticed that she did not say good morning to him or address him by name - not very encouraging signs, he thought. for the first time he noticed the woman’s resemblance to an octopus. you sent a message to the extortion hotline a few days ago, the wolf man said to orville, about a supposed message you had received. am it correct? yes i did, orville replied why did you do that? because i received a message i thought had a threatening tone. but there was no message. there was a message. i forwarded it. there was no message, except one you tried to fabricate yourself. no, there was, orville insisted weakly. the cat woman spoke. society has had quite enough of pranksters like you, and we know how to deal with you. i know you and your friends think it is all a big joke, but we can not have you overloading the system just to amuse your little scorpion brains. orville had never been compared to a scorpion before, and he did not think it fair. he opened his mouth to speak, but nothing came out. please take this seriously, the wolf man said. you have been warned, the cat woman added. with that, the wolf man and the cat woman got up and left. orville was left alone with the octopus woman. shall i go back to work? orville asked her. no, you have been terminated. please leave the building immediately. your movements will be tracked and if you do not follow this order immediately blah blah blah you know the rest. i have a picture in my work space, orville said. may i retrieve it? it will be forwarded to you, the octopus woman said. if you have any place to forward it to. and for the first time, she not only smiled, but laughed. end of part 2