Work Text:
It was for the money. Sure, it wasn’t great pay, but it was steady and had benefits and didn’t need too much education neither, which was hard to come by in this part of the system. And it kept xem out of the Ranger’s crosshairs. It was just, well, dead boring. No sugar coating it.
Most calls, xer trainer had told xem, was showing people how to navigate the new terminal setup. Change in government meant change in policy meant a whole lotta people going, ‘where did the money go’ or ‘where’d it come from’ or ‘what do you mean I can’t just file everything the old way?’ Xe’d been part of a batch of some dozen new hires; brought on and trained up to be somewhat useful just in time for the changes to be implemented.
From there, xer day was mostly staring at the double monitor setup, answering the same six questions from folks all over the system. At least, most of the time. This, hadn’t been one of those times.
Xer headset beeped, warning xer of the incoming call. Xe put down their bottle of Cosmic Cola (the only thing the vending machine carried) and rattled through the standard greeting, ending with “how can I help you today?”
The voice on the other end was harried. “Is it alright if my receipt’s been eaten by a llama?”
What.
“I beg your pardon?”
“We keep llamas, just a small herd, and they got out, and one of them apparently has a taste for paper.”
Another voice chipped in. “He’s a real prob-llama.”
“Not helping Cee,” the caller hissed.
“Fine, I’ll just wached Brother Cheeseburger. You won’t yell at me, will you, buddy?”
A yowl. A cat’s yowl, probably. Maybe something genetically engineered? Xe’d never heard anything that loud from something that small, outside of a baby crying.
“Anyway,” the caller said, “the llama kind of ate, some of the paper. Is that alright? For submission.”
“I mean, you only really need them in case of an audit,” xe said. “But why not ask for a copy? Most companies keep their invoices for at least a half a Jovian year.”
“They have a reprinting fee and a waiting period and if we take too much longer to file, we’re going to get charged another fee and then we won’t be able to upgrade the bioprinter and then we won’t be able to—”
Xe cut into the panic spiral. “Have you applied for the small business extension?”
The rush of words stopped. “The what.”
“How long’s your business been running?” Pulling up the regulations on xer terminals took no time.
She rattled off the number to the day, nervous pride coating her words.
“Right, you absolutely qualify for this. You’ve got something for the comm address?”
“Um, hang on.” There was scattered sound of scrambling. “Okay, ready.”
Xe read it off slowly. “Got it?”
“Got it,” she said with a sigh. “Thank you so much.”
Xe smiled. “Don’t mention it. Did’ya need anything else?”
“No, this is, this is great. Have a good day.”
“You too.”
The comm clicked off.
Yeah, it was for the money, and boring as hell. But it wasn’t always such a bad job.