Free Soda Pop Soldier by Nick Cole Page A

man, Faustus Mercator, asks me Are there meeting rooms above the seventy-fourth? and . . .
    . . . Are you happy?
    The large, polished mahogany conference table shines thickly as drop-down monitors, paper flat, slide from the ceiling. I can hear Kiwi bantering with JollyBoy. Outside the immense windows, gray morning wafts by in misty cloud banks. Soon all the screens are filled with the fifty-nine others who make up ColaCorp’s professional online army. Of late, an army beaten repeatedly by WonderSoft.
    â€œLadies and gentlemen,” says RangerSix from the largest screen on the main wall. He’s represented by neither avatar nor real-time image, just an old-school radio wave pulsing with the steady intonations of his speech.
    â€œFirst off I want to start with the obligatory ‘compliment sandwich,’ which all my self-improvement books tell me I need to use when talking to nonmilitary personnel. S’posed to help me in corporate America. But, dammit to hell, kids . . . there’s no time for corporate double talk. Everyone gave it their best and we still got beat, and we got beat badly. In the process we lost several assets we very much needed to take back the Song Hua river basin. Vampires got into both tank battalions, and now we’re down to three. I repeat, three tanks. Three tanks ain’t gonna support any kind of counterattack. So, in short, we’re down to the Eightieth Infantry Brigade; two artillery companies, the 661 and the 663; and what’s left of our air wing, which boils down to an attack squadron and the Albatross platoon.”
    â€œWe’ve always got snide remarks . . . oh, and lots of sticks and stones,” Kiwi offers cheerily.
    â€œNot funny, son.” RangerSix sounds like he wants to stomp on Kiwi. On my Petey, Kiwi messages me, “Too bad WonderSoft has rubber armor and we’re made of glue.”
    â€œRight, sir, sorry,” Kiwi says, chastened.
    â€œYou’re a good soldier, Kiwi, but I would be remiss if I didn’t let you know our next battle will determine whether you stay on professional status or not. Frankly, it might mean that for the rest of us also. The number crunchers at ColaCorp feel salaries, our salaries mainly, asset fees, and sponsorship could be better spent on more traditional advertising. So we have to do something right here, right now to prove them wrong. In short, boys and girls, we need a win and we need it Tuesday night. So here’s our plan . . .”
    I think about the plan.
    I think about it as snow drifts in from the front that’s making its way down onto Manhattan. High above, above the seventy-fourth floor, the bottom of Upper New York pokes through the clouds. Down here on the ground it’s business as usual, as the few commuters who still live in the old city hurry through the fading afternoon light, hoping to get home before the storm hits.
    I need to go home. I need to confront Sancerré about where she was all weekend and why she didn’t come back last night. But the check ColaCorp gives me is way too small to pay the rent. So I head to Grand Central Station. I’ve got an hour to get there, and if I don’t make it in time, I won’t be able to earn any money tonight.
    It’s money we need, Sancerré and I, to have a relationship before we end said relationship. We are, as of midnight last night, officially ten days overdue on our rent.
    Sancerré once told me that Grand Central Station used to be beautiful.
    I hate the place.
    It smells like bad patchouli and cheap disinfectant. Supposedly it once handled the entire commuting workforce of old New York. Now it’s just a series of huddled stalls. Old hippies from the double “0”s hawking their incense candles, FreakBeads, and tie-dyed Blue Market SoftEyes. I could care less about sand candles and cheap monocles that reconstruct everyone naked.
    Some people I don’t want to see