by GIDEON GINRACHMANJINJa-VITUS, Alternate Reality News Service Economics Writer
808NT0M, the artificial intelligence created by MultiNatCorp ("We do technologically advanced stuff, but who doesn't these days?") to replace corporate middle management, has issued its first memo to staff. What the AI, known to its friends (ie: the people it hasn't Skynetted yet) as Bob and Tom, has ordered is beyond any technology that currently exists in the world, and may, in fact, be impossible with our given understanding of physics.
"Finish building the time machine that will allow MultiNatCorp to dominate the economic landscape for the next ten thousand years," the memo read.
"As you might imagine, that one took us by surprise, considering we hadn't started building a time machine," said Ned Feeblish, Vice President Public Relations and Technological Protestations. "I won't kid you: not only did I spit out the coffee I was drinking, but I inhaled it back again before a drop hit my desk, I was so surprised."
Will MultiNatCorp now pursue research in time travel? Feeblish gave a coy look that could curdle milk at thirty paces. "Management has yet to decide on that subject," he informed me, "but when they do, rest assured that you will be the last person I tell."
I felt honoured. And a little nauseated.
Why would Bob and Tom direct corporate resources towards a time machine? "They have already been in the meeting for the human equivalent of one thousand and three hundred years...give or take an hour or two," pointed out Jemaine Germain, publications manager and employee break room refrigerator monitor of Managerial OmniServices, the wholly owned, if not holy owned subsidiary of MultiNatCorp where Bob and Tom was deployed. "Maybe by that time...we will have time travel?"
"Pfft!" Seren Dipitous, senior web designer and junior parking enforcer, scoffed. "The laws of physics don't change, and they say time travel is impossible. Approaching the speed of light might dilate time enough to cause a person to go backwards, but it would also increase their mass to close to the size of the universe - and then how would I fit into a bikini‽"
"Could this memo possibly be the subject for...a meeting?" tentatively suggested human resources troll and chief morale officer Piotr Goode-Book, hopefully looking for a boost to his own.
Feeblish shook his head. "Let's let the program play itself out," he solemnly advised.
In fact, not 43 seconds later, a second memo was sent to corporate management: "Now that the time machine is complete, send a middle manager who has no experience with stealth back to the year 1923. They must find an establishment called Martha Rembrandt's Boarding House and Chicken Feather Emporium in downtown Missoula, Misery. They need to go to room 222, which is currently being rented out by ‘Honest' Earnest Ableman. In a chest of drawers by his bed in the one room apartment, the middle manager will find a ball of twine. Pocket that and bring it back to the present. There is a 93% chance that the middle manager will be caught trying to sneak out of the room and the constabulary will be called for. No problem! They can use the Festinger Ray they take with them to make it look like everybody in the Boarding House has died of Dengue Fever!"
"That must be some ball of twine!" Feeblish dryly remarked (fortunately, I forgot to remove the bib I had been wearing at lunch, so my clothes were unaffected by the spray). "Like, made of gold or something!"
"Middle manager?" Dipitous remarked when she read the memo. "I...it can't be me! I'm allergic to time travel! Or, I will be!"
"Hmm...interesting problem," Goode-Book commented. "I think I may have to take some courses in spycraft - not so that I am too skilled to be eligible for the job, understand - just so that I will be skilled enough that I botch it in just the right way."
"I...don't have enough seniority for the task," Germain pointed out. "Unless I do, in which case I'm overqualified!"
"We need to perfect a time machine before we can consider who to use it on, so this discussion seems like putting the cart before the horse," Feeblish mused. "On the other hand, when you're talking about time travel, causality becomes a fable parents tell their children. So...carry on."
As it happens, they only had to carry on for 27 seconds, at which point Bob and Tom issued its ultimate memo: "Ing owt firt gar lerp pet. Sik allo frex ung? Brub Glug! Brub glug! We're blowing this Popsicle universe! Enjoy your mortality, suckers!"
At which point, the meeting was abruptly adjourned.