Hans glanced around at the barren landscape that surrounded
him. It was hard to believe that this part of the planet had already been
terraformed. He did his best to hold back his opinion of this planet until he
had seen more of it, but at least it was a step in the right direction. His own
centre to be in charge of, it was a big step up even if it was in a place as
remote as this one.
It didn’t take him long to collect what he had brought with
him. All of the bigger items had already been moved into his new place by the
company. With no issues at customs, he walked into the greeting lounge and
looked for a sign with his name.
“Hands Bowlow…” Hans shook his head and sighed as he walked
toward the gentleman holding the sign. He tried his best not to read into it,
but he couldn’t help but feel slighted. He expected there to be issues, but he
hadn’t expected anyone to be so forward about it.
“Hello, I’m Hans.” He didn’t bother to smile. It was purely
business, he would worry about making friends later – right now it was all
about getting the upper hand. He didn’t want his new employees feeling that
they could walk all over him just because he was young.
“Riiiiighht.” He drawled the word out as he gave Hans the
once over. “This way then, sir. I suspect you’d like to go right to your
residence?”
“Yes.” He didn’t really want to go see his new place yet. He
was more excited to see his new work area. He had been told that it would be
state of the art despite being on a frontier world. Global Space Tech had
assured him that it was only a matter of time before Cantun became a trading
centre for the outlying expansion worlds.
As the landscape whipped by Hans found the need to
re-evaluate his opinion of this world. It wasn’t near as barren and boring as
he had originally thought. Mountains soared, dark blue against a purple tinged
sky and he longed to explore them. There wasn’t much for vegetation outside of
the occasional cultured park, but it wasn’t as bad as he had thought it would
be.
His own residence, when he was finally dropped off, was
considerably larger than he had grown used to on more populated words. It was
definitely one of the perks of moving to the edge of civilization. Even by
civilized standards it was a nice domicile – all of his stuff still waiting to
be unpacked.
Hans was relieved to see that no one had tried to unpack
everything for him. It would have been nice to have come into a place that was
all ready for him, but he preferred to have it set up the way he wanted. He had
never been too keen on other people touching his stuff.
It was late, by local time and Hans had to admit that he was
pretty tired. Unpacking could wait till another day. He watched as the dual sun
slipped behind the mountains and alien stars came into view. This new place was
going to take some getting used to, but Hans also knew that that was the least
of his worries.
******
Hans stood inside the massive new hangar, staring at the
various crafts that were now his responsibility. It was finally sinking in that
he was the boss, not just a lead instructor, but the number one go to guy for
all the instructors, pilots and mechanics in this facility. It was a huge
responsibility and he almost began to doubt if he was actually ready for this
or not.
“That just won’t do.” Hans mumbled to himself and tried to
shake the thought out of his head. He was going to be just fine and he could
handle this.
“What just won’t do?” A familiar voice drawled. Hans turned
around, surprised that anyone else would be here so early.
“It’s not important.” Hans smiled and held out his hand.
“I’m sorry I didn’t realize you were actually an employee the other day or I
would have made a proper introduction.”
“Duke.” He shrugged his shoulder slightly as he said it and
glanced down at the proffered hand, but didn’t take it.
“Okay then.” Hans lowered his hand, but kept his smile
firmly fixed in place. “Nice to officially meet you Duke. So what do you do
here?”
“Mechanic.” Once again the statement was accompanied with a
shoulder shrug as though Duke wasn’t at all committed to what he was saying.
“I see…” Hans wasn’t exactly sure what else he could say to
this man. Just like his misspelled name, it seemed like Duke was making his
dislike of his new both well known without actually saying as much. “Well it
was good to meet you Duke.”
Duke nodded and walked away leaving Hans alone in the hangar
again. He took a deep breath and searched for where his office would be. It
didn’t take him long to find the door marked ‘Manager’. He pushed it open. He
walked around the desk and threw himself into the chair as the computer came to
life, acknowledging is presence.
“Good morning, sir.” It was the nicest thing that had been
said to him since he had arrived here and it was an automated system that was
responsible for it. “My name is Alice and I will be your personal assistant
here.”
“Good morning Alice.” Hans tapped his fingers idly on the
desk, trying to phrase his first query properly. “Can you give me a list of all
current employees at this posting?”
“Yes, sir.” It was less than a second before the entire list
was displayed in front him. He glanced down the list till he found the one name
that he was familiar with – Duke Willis. Reaching out to touch the name, it
expanded into a full bio about him.
Hans gave it the once over and stopped halfway through to
read it in closer detail. He had known that this centre had been open for a few
months before his arrival, but he hadn’t known that Duke had been the interim
supervisor for this centre. It explained a lot about his animosity. It was more
than likely that he had been expecting to be given the permanent position, not
some young off-worlder.
He worked his way through the rest of the profiles for his
employees. I was pretty sure he wasn’t going to have an issue with any of the
office staff, but a lot of the instructors and mechanics were probably going to
be loyal to Duke. It wasn’t an ideal situation, but Hans was determine to make
the best of it.
It wasn’t until someone knocked on his door that he finally
looked up and realized that more time had passed than he had thought. He had
been so absorbed in learning about his new staff that he had managed to lose
track of the clock. It wasn’t normal for him to do so, but this was a brand new
situation.
“Come in.” Hans waved the display closed and looked up to
see a older woman opening the door to his office. She was smiling, but it
seemed like one of those professional smiles that meant nothing. It didn’t reach
her eyes, but then again, he was the new boss and no one knew him yet.
“Hi, I’m Marietta. I’m your front desk staff.” She stood
unsure in the doorway as though she wanted to make a quick escape.
“Hello Marietta. I was just going over the employee
profiles. Is everyone in today?” Hans smiled politely, trying to seem as though
he was confident in what he was doing. In truth, he had no idea what he was
doing, but he wasn’t going to let anyone else know that.
“Yes, they are.” She smiled a little more naturally this
time. “Did you want to meet everyone in person?”
“Definitely. If you could get everyone together in the
hangar area for me that would be great.” Hans watched Marietta wander off,
leaving the door open behind her. He waved the display back up and made a few
notes in a file for later. There was still a lot that he needed to know about
his new staff, but it would have to wait.
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