noth hierth malk man

sir john franklin is running a tech startup and pushes everyone into a code sprint so desperate that they are left scorbutic from 36 hours of gatorade

Sir John Franklin was never one to successfully use the Zoom videoconference function and so without variation or failure, when everyone from Product assembled in the Terror conference room, they were subjected to five solid minutes of unmuted struggle.

“Jane my dear,” Franklin was saying, “I really cannot find the blasted on button.”

There was some rustling, a sound like a traffic accident, and a flicker of video that revealed Sir John’s face so close to the camera that all that could be seen of him was his left eye, wide and helpless. Video cut out again, and they heard Sir John imploring a Google Home and Alexa for simultaneous help with the setup.

“This is wasting time,” said Crozier. Crozier had survived four startups and countless sprints. He knew Agile like he knew the taste of whiskey. And although the circumstances of Sir John Franklin’s new startup, NWP, were somewhat suspect, he had complete faith in his product. Faith, desperation, and a lack of other options. He had taken the job for equity instead of salary, initially assuming he would be able to hire his own team and gamble on their talent. In the end he’d only been able to bring a few developers on – Blanky, Little, and Jopson – and every morning, gazing at his own increasingly haggard face in the mirror, he asked how it had all come to this, how his future rode on some fuckwit who couldn’t select “component” from a dropdown.

The scrum master, James Fitzjames, gave Crozier a look of intense dislike and took the conference room off mute. “Sir John,” he said calmly, his voice not even rough from the eight o’clock meeting start or the fact that it was fully the second week of the sprint. He was drinking a Soylent Café Chai from a mug that featured a black and white picture of Rei Kawakubo’s face. “Sir John, we’re getting a bit of background noise.”

“Really,” said Sir John, then, more quietly: “My dearest darling, may I persuade you to hop off my lap?”

“Quite a lot of background noise,” said Fitzjames more urgently. “I wonder if we might kick things off here while you sort out the tech?”

There was a loud crash from Sir John’s side, and what sounded like a cat yowling.

Crozier could feel the team’s resentful agony for every harrowing moment. They had a check in with Sir John every day at eight, and every day at eight Sir John found a new and innovative way to waste their time. Their precious, dwindling time. Although he lived only ten minutes uptown, Sir John had visited the office space only once and declared it “awfully cramped.”

And here they were a week and a half from launch, sleeping in minutes and half-hours on the toilets or beanbags or not at all, Postmatesing themselves Gatorades and Soylent Coffee and nootropic gum, and Sir John still couldn’t bother to show up to the meeting he wanted so badly. Crozier was reaching for the microphone when the first developer passed out.

Everyone stood up at once, except some of Young’s friends who were trying to keep him from sliding to the floor. “Mr. Young!” shouted Crozier, and several other people. 

Sir John’s video turned on, and his face suddenly filled the conference room screen. “There we are – I say! Is everything alright there, Crozier?”

Crozier did not answer him, turning instead to the occupants of the Terror conference room. “Is someone ringing 999?” he shouted.

“I am,” said Fitzjames with aggressive calm, gesturing to his phone which he held to his ear.

Crozier, feeling some relief, tried to keep the room in order: “Someone—Goodsir, get him some water. From the filter, not the sink. Get him on the floor with his feet elevated, and someone—Jopson—go to his desk and see if he has an open session. James, what is it?”

Fitzjames had lost his calm, and judging from his frantic search of his pockets, something very small. “My phone is connected to my Airpods,” he said. “But I can’t seem to find them—I’ve got 999 on the line but no audio.”

Crozier stared at him.

It was then that the fire alarm went off. Crozier counted his devs. Cornelius Hickey, a devious hire whose last resume item was the Fyre App team, was missing.