Ko. Let go.
Fired. I believe the standard phrase is ‘no longer in good employment
standing with the company.’” He showed no expression, but the orange
segment he held was in shreds.
She let her fork clatter down onto her
plate. “Fired?” She had never personally known anyone who was fired
from Ko. Plenty of transfers, sure: Ko was enormous, big enough to
change a person's country, class, lifestyle, family dynamics, just by
reassigning her to another job, complete with intensive cultural
retraining and psychological support. Firing was an utter dismissal, a
condemnation: how would Sawyer live, when so many prospective employers
were trading partners or vendors that could not afford to take the
chance of violating the no-hire clause that was standard in Ko
contracts? “Where did he go?”
“He and his family left the island
yesterday. Dona wasn't able to find out his final destination. He has
people in Burma, I think, but things are very bad there right now. It's
his kids I feel sorry for: he was incredibly stupid, by the sound of
it.”
“What do you mean?”
“You have to disappoint Ko in a very big
way to be dismissed with prejudice. It's your Neill's fault, you know,”
he added.
“He's not my Neill. Why is it his fault?”
Carlos closed his mouth and turned to
cleaning the orange pulp off his fingers with his napkin. Jackal and
Snow exchanged a look.
“Papa.”
“I've said too much already.”
The trick with her father was to be quiet
and wait. He could no more keep his mind still than his body, and he
loved to talk things out.
“He's in my web, did you know that?” She
hadn't: it made it more personal, somehow, that her father knew Sawyer
so well and now he was gone. “Yes, he's older than he looks,” Carlos
went on, anticipating her next thought with an eerie precision. “He
hadn't done as well as some, but he was a good team lead. His boss,
she's another web mate, and she really wanted to find a way to make him
successful. This thing with Neill, that was his big chance to shine.
But—”
Jackal nodded. Sawyer's struggle had been
obvious from that first lunch. She said, “He got to be good at the
techniques. When he had to run one of our meetings, he could handle
himself just as well as anyone else. But he just never really seemed to
get comfortable. He never committed.”
“He talked to me about it a couple of
times,” Carlos said. “He was determined to manage it for the sake of
his career. But he said it felt wrong seeing independent, quirky people
suddenly turned into well-functioning worker units—I think that's how
he phrased it.”
“It's not like that,” Jackal said.
“Mmm,” Carlos said.
Jackal decided to ignore that. “So what
happened?” she asked.
“He was given a new project recently—” He
stopped abruptly. “The one you and your mother fought about, was it
Garbo?”
Jackal nodded.
“That's the one. Jeremy was supposed to
handle it until the transfer to Dona, that's why he came to talk to her
about it. He didn't know about the reassignment.” Carlos tried to
smile. “Jeremy stuck up for you. He thought you were very good. He said
everyone could see you'd be getting the same amount of attention even
if you weren't the Hope, because you were earning it.”
Jackal bet her mother had just loved that.
She would have to tell Sawyer not to…and then she remembered that she
couldn't tell him anything, ever again: he was gone, swallowed up by
one of the innumerable frightening things that awaited someone forcibly
disconnected from the world's most powerful corporation.
Her father said grimly, “He did it to
himself. He sat right where Snow is now and agonized over his damned
principles, whether he could work on a project that he didn't approve
of.”
“What was it he didn't like?”
Carlos shook his head. “He wouldn't say
anything specific, only that the technology was dangerous. Dona tried
to make him understand that she had access to all the records
Fired. I believe the standard phrase is ‘no longer in good employment
standing with the company.’” He showed no expression, but the orange
segment he held was in shreds.
She let her fork clatter down onto her
plate. “Fired?” She had never personally known anyone who was fired
from Ko. Plenty of transfers, sure: Ko was enormous, big enough to
change a person's country, class, lifestyle, family dynamics, just by
reassigning her to another job, complete with intensive cultural
retraining and psychological support. Firing was an utter dismissal, a
condemnation: how would Sawyer live, when so many prospective employers
were trading partners or vendors that could not afford to take the
chance of violating the no-hire clause that was standard in Ko
contracts? “Where did he go?”
“He and his family left the island
yesterday. Dona wasn't able to find out his final destination. He has
people in Burma, I think, but things are very bad there right now. It's
his kids I feel sorry for: he was incredibly stupid, by the sound of
it.”
“What do you mean?”
“You have to disappoint Ko in a very big
way to be dismissed with prejudice. It's your Neill's fault, you know,”
he added.
“He's not my Neill. Why is it his fault?”
Carlos closed his mouth and turned to
cleaning the orange pulp off his fingers with his napkin. Jackal and
Snow exchanged a look.
“Papa.”
“I've said too much already.”
The trick with her father was to be quiet
and wait. He could no more keep his mind still than his body, and he
loved to talk things out.
“He's in my web, did you know that?” She
hadn't: it made it more personal, somehow, that her father knew Sawyer
so well and now he was gone. “Yes, he's older than he looks,” Carlos
went on, anticipating her next thought with an eerie precision. “He
hadn't done as well as some, but he was a good team lead. His boss,
she's another web mate, and she really wanted to find a way to make him
successful. This thing with Neill, that was his big chance to shine.
But—”
Jackal nodded. Sawyer's struggle had been
obvious from that first lunch. She said, “He got to be good at the
techniques. When he had to run one of our meetings, he could handle
himself just as well as anyone else. But he just never really seemed to
get comfortable. He never committed.”
“He talked to me about it a couple of
times,” Carlos said. “He was determined to manage it for the sake of
his career. But he said it felt wrong seeing independent, quirky people
suddenly turned into well-functioning worker units—I think that's how
he phrased it.”
“It's not like that,” Jackal said.
“Mmm,” Carlos said.
Jackal decided to ignore that. “So what
happened?” she asked.
“He was given a new project recently—” He
stopped abruptly. “The one you and your mother fought about, was it
Garbo?”
Jackal nodded.
“That's the one. Jeremy was supposed to
handle it until the transfer to Dona, that's why he came to talk to her
about it. He didn't know about the reassignment.” Carlos tried to
smile. “Jeremy stuck up for you. He thought you were very good. He said
everyone could see you'd be getting the same amount of attention even
if you weren't the Hope, because you were earning it.”
Jackal bet her mother had just loved that.
She would have to tell Sawyer not to…and then she remembered that she
couldn't tell him anything, ever again: he was gone, swallowed up by
one of the innumerable frightening things that awaited someone forcibly
disconnected from the world's most powerful corporation.
Her father said grimly, “He did it to
himself. He sat right where Snow is now and agonized over his damned
principles, whether he could work on a project that he didn't approve
of.”
“What was it he didn't like?”
Carlos shook his head. “He wouldn't say
anything specific, only that the technology was dangerous. Dona tried
to make him understand that she had access to all the records
Similar Books
