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Stratt disliked silence. She used to enjoy the peace it brought her to sit in silence and think, but as the director of a critical mission to save the world, any moment that was not loud with the urgency to act made her nervous.
That was one of the reasons she enjoyed Ryland Grace’s presence in her office while they worked on their own separate problems. His incessant tapping and fidgeting and moving while he worked brought enough of the urgency to her attention to be able to focus on arranging the talking points of the next meeting. The first time this arrangement had happened, she had called him into her office to confirm something in the lab. When his notes had deviated from her record on the tablet, he had sat down to solve the issue. Since then, she had left her door slightly ajar in hopes of him finding his way back to her office with a question or just for the sake of sitting across from her and working.
On days when he was too busy to work in her room, she grew restless of the silence and found a random German show on the television and let it play on low volume. She could tune out the words and focus on her work better with something filling the silence of the room. Grace knocked on her door on a day when the television was running. He peaked his head through the door at her response to enter.
“Permission to enter?”
She waved a hand for him to come in before turning back to her tablet. Grace sat across from her at his usual seat and pushed a few stacks of papers to the side so he could lay his laptop on the table.
“Be careful with those.” Stratt gestured to the papers. “I still need to sign them.”
“Sorry, should I move them back?”
She glanced at the stacks. They were still arranged the way she had placed them, just shifted a little to the right of the table.
“No, it’s fine. I will stack them on the other side next time.”
“Oh, I don’t need to work here if it bothers you or makes you change your workflow.”
“No,” she said too quickly for her own liking, “you don’t bother me.”
He gave a hesitant smile as he set about arranging his own materials for his work. Grace was a few minutes into working when he frowned and looked up at her. He noticed how deep in thought she was and turned around.
“Oh, you have a tv on. I was wondering where the sound was coming from.”
Stratt looked up, her mind still on the graphs on the tablet. “Yes, I have it on for background noise. I can turn it off.”
Grace turned his chair to face the television. “What is this even?”
Stratt focused on the show that was currently on. “It is a German show called Schlag den Star.” She turned back to her work.
“They’re cutting bananas in half.”
Stratt sighed and looked up again. “Yes, they cut it in half and weigh it to see who is closest to cutting it perfectly.”
Grace watched in silence as the man in the red shirt sliced a banana. Stratt winced at the angle of the cut.
“He will lose. He changed the angle and made it uneven. The other contestant had a better technique.” She was right. The red shirted man’s banana was 0.57 grams off as opposed to blue shirt’s 0.11. Grace turned back to her with bewildered amazement on his face.
“People make shows like this? And people actually watch it?”
“Yes, it is highly entertaining.”
Grace watched as each contestant was handed a large misshapen potato.
“Oh no, that’s not fair!” Grace pointed at the screen.
“What is?”
“The potatoes! They’re both so different, it’s not a fair competition when the shapes don’t match up.”
“The shape does not matter to a professional.”
“A professional. A professional potato cutter?”
“Yes, why enter a competition if you are under-qualified? If they are professional, it does not matter if the shapes are not the same.”
The man in the blue shirt observed the vegetable from every angle before setting it down and slicing through it without pausing. It was a smooth, clean cut. Grace hummed his appreciation for the technique. The man in the red shirt lifted the vegetable and tried to balance it on the dull side of the knife to find the center point. Grace gasped.
“What is he doing? That’s such a stupid way to cut it!”
Stratt set her tablet down and folded her arms on the table. The vegetable looked absurd as it balanced on the knife. The man removed it and sliced through it with precision.
“He will win.” Stratt nodded. Again, she was right.
“How?” Grace looked at her with awe.
Stratt shrugged. “You just know when you see it.”
Grace abandoned his work and sat transfixed in front of the television. He tried guessing, got most of them wrong. Meanwhile, Stratt only had to look up once in a while and she would guess correctly. When it was clear that no real work was getting done, Stratt set a timer on her phone for 15 minutes for television enjoyment and raised the volume a few bars. She sipped her coffee while she propped her head in her hand. Grace leaned back in his own seat to hear her translation of what was being said on the television.
“I know you said they’re supposed to be professionals, but how is that even fair?” He pointed at the knobby ginger pieces that were handed to the men.
Stratt nodded. “Ginger is difficult, both because of the shape and the texture. Cutting through will be hard enough, on top of making it even.”
Red team placed the vegetable on the table and rested the knife in the middle. He adjusted the angle a few times before slicing it in half.
“Oh, that’s good. I’m betting on them.” Grace clapped his hands.
“No, it is very bad. The other team will have to be much worse if red team wins this.”
Blue team stood the ginger up on the table and started slicing through the entire vegetable. Stratt gasped.
“Fuck, that is bad. You may win this round if he keeps doing this.”
The man finished slicing it and placed both halves on the table. Even from just a visual aspect, it was clear it would be very uneven.
“Red team is off by 0.45 grams.” Stratt translated the host’s commentary.
“Okay, that’s good. It’s not too bad.”
“Blue team is off by… 0.77 grams.”
Grace spun his chair around and raised both hands in the air. “I win!”
“Yes, congratulations.” Stratt reached for the controller and switched off the television. She stopped her timer with ten minutes left to go.
“Hey, wait, I wanted to see more.”
“We have work to get back to. The world is counting on us.”
“Fine,” he sighed.
He was distracted afterwards. Stratt could tell because he sat still in his seat. The office was silent and Stratt was starting to feel that uncomfortable itch again. Grace stared at his screen but his eyes were fixed to one spot any time Stratt glanced across at him.
“We can watch more when we are done.” She said after a full minute of silence.
Grace sat up straighter. “Sure, that sounds fun.”
“Get back to work or we won’t watch it.”
“Yes, ma’am.” He fixed his eyes on the screen again, this time with a small smile on his face. His pattern of fidgeting and tapping the table resumed and Stratt relaxed.
Stratt would not admit it, but she also felt more productive with the set goal of watching the show after her job was done. Hours ticked by but the usual overwhelming hopelessness of the world did not consume her the way it usually would. At the end of the day, instead of retiring to her room to keep working on her tablet, she set it down and looked up at Ryland Grace. He felt her gaze on her and immediately slammed the laptop shut.
“Show time?” He said eagerly.
Stratt turned the television on and found the next episode of the show. Grace pulled out a packet of Twizzlers from his computer bag.
“Those are disgusting.” Stratt scowled.
“They are not, have you ever had one before?”
“No, the smell is off putting. Food should be that color.”
“It’s not food, it’s candy.” He reached into the packet and pulled out a string of the candy. He held it out to her. “At least taste it before you judge it.”
Stratt reluctantly took it. Grace watched her face as she took a small bite. It was worse than she expected.
“It tastes like perfumed rubber.”
“I will not accept this blasphemy.” Grace reached across the table and pulled it out of her fingers. He placed the bit end into his own mouth. “I’m not letting this go to waste.” He mumbled around the candy.
Stratt could still taste the disgusting aftertaste of the candy, but it did not stop her from thinking the Twizzler would have tasted better had it been in Grace’s mouth first. She wondered where the thought had come from.
Stratt rounded the table and sat in the other chair beside Grace. When his attention drifted to the screen, Stratt reached across and pulled the candy out from between his lips. Grace gasped, started to reach out to grab her wrist, stopped at the last second. She nibbled on the wet end of the Twizzler. Somehow, it tasted marginally better. She gestured to the television with the candy.
“Red shirt will win.”
Grace’s attention was fixed on her. “You said it was disgusting. Give it back if it’s so bad.”
“I can get used to the taste.” She nibbled at it again.
Grace looked a little more red than normal. Stratt felt a jolt of satisfaction at having caused him to lose his composure. Not that it was difficult to do so. He lost his cool around her daily, and she was pleased to be the cause. With the wet end of the candy gone now, the dry plastic taste hit full force. Stratt handed it back to him, watched intently as he took it from her and placed it in his mouth again. When her hand twitched to take it back, Grace turned his head and shoved the entire candy into his mouth. He had caught on to her plan. Too bad, it could have been fun.
“Oh no,” Grace pointed at the screen. “They’re bringing out corn.”
“Hmm, that will be difficult. The kernels will fall off if they cut it wrong.”
“He’s cutting it wrong! It’s so wrong!”
“They are also not being safe with the knives. It is good that they have safety gloves.”
“No kidding, I would have accidentally sliced my hand off by now.”
“You would not be on this show.”
“Oh really? I bet I can predict who wins this round.”
“What are you betting for?”
“A million bucks.”
“Money is inconsequential to us. Bet for something else.”
“I can’t think of something else.” He said.
“You only have a few seconds left. Make your bet and name your prize.”
Red team placed the knife in the middle of the vegetable and started sawing down. He paused half way to switch to a serrated knife.
“Oh shoot, it looks good but I don’t think the weight would be the same if you just slice at the center. One end of the corn is slimmer than the other and he just sliced straight down in the middle.”
“So you bet on the blue team?”
“Yes, I think he’s going to win.”
The red team placed the two halves on the scales. The deviation was by 0.13 grams. Stratt smiled. Despite looking uneven, it had been pretty close in weight.
“Your prize?” Stratt said.
“I can’t think of anything!”
Blue lifted the halves.
“Say it now or you win nothing.”
“An ice cream machine!” Grace leaned forward in the chair.
0.03 deviation. Stratt’s eyebrows shot up. Oh, shit. She owed Ryland Grace an ice cream machine. Stratt let out a baffled laugh.
“I win!” He turned to her. “You have to get me an ice cream machine now!”
“I am aware.” Stratt reached for her phone. “I will get you your ice cream machine.”
She wondered how she was supposed to explain this at the monthly expense committee meeting. Ryland Grace bet for an ice cream machine and he won. There was only one solution. She would have to watch the show and memorize who won so he could never beat her again at this game. Stratt sent a message for the purchase and delivery of the machine. It would be flown in and assembled in Grace’s room on the Vat. There was no way anyone would think she was showing favoritism, right? That night, Stratt fell asleep to the show playing on her tablet. She would never lose this game again.
It was a week later when Grace entered her office again for their parallel work session. He carried an ice cream cone in his hand that he displayed proudly.
“You walked down the hall with that?” Stratt watched a drop of the ice cream melt and fall on her floor. She pulled a wet wipe from her drawer and held it out for him. Grace set his computer case on the ground by her desk.
“Yes, I wanted everyone to know I’m eating ice cream and they’re not.” He took the wipe and bent over to wipe the splatter on the ground. A few extra drops fell at the movement. “Oops, I’ll clean it.”
“Did you leave a trail of ice cream on the ground from your room to my office?”
Grace grinned sheepishly. “Are you hiding from Hansel and Gretel?”
“That’s not… what?”
“You know, Hansel and Gretel. They follow a trail of bread? Or wait, were they leaving a trail of bread? I don’t remember.”
“What does that have to do with ice cream?”
“Because of the trail, oh never mind.” He licked the softening cone.
“I will send someone to mop the ground.”
“I can do it, I just need to know where the mop bucket is.”
“You have more important work. Come sit down before you mess up my floor again.”
Grace tossed the wet wipe into the trash can by her desk. He set his computer on the desk with one hand, brought the cone to his mouth with the other. Stratt found herself unable to look away. Maybe it wasn’t so bad that she had lost. Grace caught her staring. He held the hand with the cone out toward her. She shook her head.
“It’s yours to enjoy.”
“I don’t mind sharing.”
“You won’t share with anyone on the ship but you are offering it to me?”
“Fine then, I’ll enjoy it on my own.” He shrugged and bit into the cone.
When their work was finished for the day and Grace pulled another pack of Twizzlers from his bag, Stratt sat beside him and found an episode. He offered her a Twizzler, she waved it off.
“I wonder what I’ll win today.” Grace said.
“What would I win?”
“What do you want?”
The contestants were greeting each other with the formalities necessary for the show. She recognized the episode.
“You will attend all my meetings for the next week and will not complain about it.”
Grace turned to her, horrified. “Oh no, please don’t make me do that.”
“You should pray that you win.”
“I’m going to bet for something big.”
“Bigger than the ice cream machine?”
“Yes, I’m going to bet for you to sing at karaoke this Friday.”
Stratt raised her eyebrows. “That’s bigger?”
“I can bet for something else and you can do karaoke for free, if that’s what you’re getting at.”
“No, it’s fine. I was not aware of the vast discrepancy between our understanding of a big bet.”
The first vegetable was a carrot. Grace gasped at the size of them.
“I had no idea they grew that big.” He said.
“And they left the leaves on, that changes the center point of the weight.”
“Are we betting now before they start cutting so it’s fair or should we take turns betting first? Should we just bet on one team for the entire game?”
Stratt thought back to the outcomes of this episode. Blue had won most of the rounds.
“I will bet on Blue.”
“Suits me, I’ll bet on Red.” Grace shrugged.
Blue would lose this first round. His slice had visibly been unbalanced. Grace grinned.
“How many songs are you going to sing?”
“You never specified. I can sing half a song and you would not be able to protest.”
“Dang it.” Grace slapped his leg. “I’ll be more specific next time.”
The next vegetable was a cauliflower. Despite pieces of it falling off during the slicing, Blue managed to win the round.
“Hmm, I have another meeting to arrange.” Stratt reached for her tablet. Grace caught her hand.
“You didn’t say you could add meetings. If I can’t say how many songs, you can’t change how many meetings.”
“Your logic is sound. I will not add any more.”
“Good,” he let go of her hand. Grace set his packet of candy down and leaned forward in his chair. “What even is that?” Grace pointed at the television.
“It is kohlrabi.”
“What?”
“You do not have this vegetable?”
“I’ve never seen it before in my life.”
“How do I explain? It is like turnip cabbage.”
“That does not explain it at all.”
Blue won the round again. Grace grumbled and chewed at his candy. The next round included oddly shaped broccoli. Again, Blue won. Stratt crossed her arms and grinned at the screen. The competition may not have been fair since she had cheated, but it did not make the satisfaction of winning any less. Red won a few rounds, but in the end, Blue team was crowned champion. Stratt turned off the television.
“I have thirty seven meetings this week,” Stratt found her schedule on her phone. “I will send the schedule to you so you may be ready for them.”
“Thirty seven?” Grace gasped. “In a week? That’s more than five meetings a day!”
“Yes, and you will be there for each of them.”
Grace packed his computer away and left without a word.
Stratt enjoyed the suffering Grace had to endure over the next few days. He was getting a taste of what her life had become, and he was overwhelmed. He stared straight ahead at a wall for the entire duration of the first meeting.
“Can we take a break?” He begged as the people around them stood up to leave at the end.
“No, we stay here. Our next meeting begins in three minutes.”
“You don’t get any breaks?”
“No, we don’t need them. The meeting was thirty minutes long, it does not even technically count as a meeting.” She pushed the sleeve of her left arm up to glance at her watch. “Our four o’clock meeting will last two hours.”
Grace threw his head back and groaned.
“You can bring your computer tomorrow. Do your own work while we talk.”
“Can I go grab it now?”
Stratt glanced at the watch again. “Can you do it in two minutes?”
“Yes,” Grace shoved his chair back and fled from the room. He was back in a little over a minute, panting and slightly sweating, but on time. He sat down in his seat beside her and brought up the documents he needed to review.
The people for the next meeting filed in and took their seats. Stratt counted that everyone was present before standing up to start the meeting. Having the silence filled must have also helped Grace’s concentration, he appeared to be engrossed in his work. He hadn’t so much as tapped the table the way he normally would in her office. Huh. Maybe she wasn’t the only one that worked better in a busy environment. He barely even noticed when the meeting concluded and everyone left the room.
“Dr. Grace?”
“Huh?” Grace looked up. “Oh, it’s over?”
“We have a half hour break before the next one begins.”
He yawned. “Can I take a nap here?”
“You will not be uncomfortable?”
“If I go to my room I’ll sleep through my alarm. It’s better for me to sleep here so I don’t miss the meeting.”
If Ryland Grace was tired, he could be putting millions—billions of people’s lives in danger. A slight miscalculation, a thoughtless measurement issue, and it would not matter how many astronauts went to Tau Ceti, they would all die.
“If you need rest, go to your room. We can call off the bet.”
“No, no, it’s nothing like that, I’m just sleepy from everyone droning on and on about boring stuff.”
“Are you sure? We can say you did enough for today.”
“I’m sure. I just need to shut my eyes for a few minutes to reset.”
“If that’s the case, alright. I will wake you up before they start coming.”
Grace muttered his appreciation and rested his head on his arms on the table. A few minutes later his shoulders dropped and his breathing evened out. Impressive. Very impressive how he was able to ignore her presence enough to fall asleep. She had never considered herself to be a scary or an authoritarian person, but people usually felt uncomfortable around her. She was the person they were seeking out to avoid, not the person that made them feel safe enough to sleep around. Maybe Grace had no sense of personal security. That would explain the candy and daily misuse of the personal protection equipment in the lab. She wondered why Grace was so tired when it was barely noon.
The next meeting flew by in a blur. And the next, and the next. Soon it was the end of the day and Grace stood up. He stretched his arms over his head, flashing a sliver of his stomach.
“You know, this wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be. I actually got a lot of work done.”
“Good, because you have six more days of this.” Stratt gathered her papers.
“I’ll spend each one thinking about what I’m going to bet for next. It’s going to be so much bigger than karaoke, you’ll see.”
Stratt smiled. “Looking forward to it.”
Grace kept true to his word. He did not complain in any of the meetings for the rest of the week. On Monday, he sat in her office once again and chewed on his sour skittles.
“I’ve decided on what I’m betting for.”
“As have I.”
“If I win, we are doing a marathon of the Star Trek movies.”
“How many are there?”
“Fourteen. And we will watch all of them in order.”
“I assume it will be over the course of the next two weeks, one film a night?”
“That’s right.”
“In that case if I win, you will not consume sugar of any kind for the next two weeks.”
Grace’s mouth dropped open. “That’s so much worse!”
“You were free to choose your reward.” She shrugged.
“Hold on now, since when did your reward become my punishment?”
“Your reward is my punishment also, I feel we are equal.”
“Fine, I don’t care. I’ll win anyway.”
The contestants greeted each other and the host. Stratt knew the outcome of this game.
“This time we should decide who we bet on each round instead of the same person throughout.” Grace said.
“What if we say the same person?”
“Then that round doesn’t count.”
“Suits me.”
The contestants were handed a large eggplant each. Red deliberated over the angle of the cut, finally sliced through at a diagonal angle. Blue lifted the vegetable up and inspected it from every side. He placed it on the cutting board and made a clean cut from the stem to the end of the vegetable.
“I’ll be a gentleman and let you bet first.”
“Red.”
Grace paused. “I was going to say red too.”
Red won with 0.09 difference while blue had 0.20. They brought out a comically long cucumber for the next round. Both teams sliced carefully lengthwise down the cucumber. They paused to check the angulation at the last section, before cutting through that as well.
“I’ll go first and say red again.” Grace said.
“Same.”
Blue had a difference of 0.019. Red was 0.006. Grace eyed her. The next vegetable was a plump radish handed to the contestants.
“Blue.” Grace said.
Stratt narrowed her eyes at him. “You know the answers.”
“So do you.”
Stratt did not deny it. “I assume you know the outcome of this game.”
“As do you.”
“So all bets are null and void. It will not be fair if you cheated.”
“If I cheated? You cheated too! You probably already watched all the episodes so you never lost a bet to me.”
“What about you, Dr. Can I Sleep At Every Break? Why are you so tired this past week? Staying up to watch all the episodes?”
“How dare you accuse me of cheating when you also cheated?”
“The bets are off. We will not be watching this show again if you continue to cheat like this.”
“Unbelievable,” Grace shook his head. “I had to suffer through a week’s worth of punishment and you got off without having to do anything.”
“I got you an ice cream machine that I will have to explain about in our next budgeting meeting. Be glad you will not be in the room when I tell them how vitally important it was to get Dr. Grace his own ice cream machine.”
“Meh, at least I get free ice cream.” Grace stood up and saluted. “Good night, director. Maybe we can play another game someday if you can stop cheating to win.”
“Good night, Grace. Maybe you will win a game someday without having to rely on cheating.”
Grace was grinning when he left her office. Stratt lowered the volume of the television and flipped to another channel. The show had lost all appeal now that she knew the outcome of each game. She found a nature documentary and propped her tablet on her lap. If and when Grace decided he had found another game for them to play, Stratt would be ready to win by any and all means necessary. Until that time, she had work to do.