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Chapter 2: You’re Fired
After his shift ended, Leo followed Dave into the cramped office at the back of the café. Dave didn’t waste time on pleasantries. With a heavy sigh, he swiveled his computer monitor toward Leo.
On the screen was an email from “Daily Grind Hospitality Group – Atlantic Region – Human Resources Department.”
Subject: Guidance on Maintaining Brand Image Consistency and Proactively Mitigating Potential Public Relations Risks
Body: To all branch managers, in order to ensure our brand maintains its consistently positive and neutral image amidst the current complex and volatile public discourse, headquarters advises proactive evaluation of employees who may pose ‘value misalignment’ risks. For forward-looking risk management, we recommend timely optimization of relevant positions to preserve team cohesion and brand integrity…
Leo skimmed the jargon-filled text, already picturing the person behind it—a sharply dressed HR vice president earning upwards of $200,000 a year, someone whose life philosophy boiled down to reducing human beings to line items of risk or profit on a balance sheet.
At the bottom of the email was a PDF attachment. Dave clicked it open. The file contained screenshots of several tweets, with one standing out immediately—the infamous NewDealGhost post about Omni Corporation. His handle and Roosevelt profile picture were circled in glaring red.
It all made sense now.
“Leo,” Dave began, his voice heavy with exhaustion, avoiding eye contact entirely. “I’m just a store manager. Above me is the regional manager, and above them, the district director. My son has a dentist appointment next month—insurance doesn’t cover everything—and I’ve got a mortgage to pay. I don’t have a choice.”
He didn’t say the word “fired.” It was too blunt, too devoid of humanity. Instead, he slid a plain white envelope across the desk.
“This is your paycheck for this month, plus an extra week’s salary as per company policy,” Dave said quietly.
Leo felt no anger, no urge to argue. What surged through him wasn’t rage directed at any single person but a deep, bone-chilling absurdity. He hadn’t been fired by Dave; Dave was merely the terminal executing orders. Nor had he been dismissed by some faceless VP of HR buried in corporate bureaucracy.
“Take care, Dave,” Leo muttered, picking up the nearly weightless envelope before walking out of the office.
He cut through the alley behind the café, disappearing into Pittsburgh’s night. The city, once renowned for its steel mills, now shimmered only in patches where glass skyscrapers belonging to banks and tech firms pierced the skyline. Beyond that, entire neighborhoods languished under a rust-colored gloom, their former glory forgotten.
Back in his tiny apartment reeking of cheap coffee, Leo flicked on the light. He placed the envelope containing his severance pay beside the ominous final overdue notice from the Federal Student Aid Office. One represented capital, the other government. Together, they sealed his fate.
Despair crashed over him like a tidal wave.
Stumbling to the cabinet, he retrieved a half-empty bottle of bargain-bin whiskey. Unscrewing the cap, he took a long swig straight from the bottle. The fiery liquid scorched his throat but failed to ignite even a shred of warmth within him.
His gaze landed on the faded Roosevelt poster hanging on the wall. In the photo, Roosevelt sat in an open-top car, smiling and waving, exuding the unshakable confidence characteristic of his era.
The alcohol and pent-up fury ignited simultaneously.
Leo grabbed the half-empty whiskey bottle, raising it high above his head. Muscles strained against his skin as he prepared to hurl it at the wall, shattering both the bottle and the smug smile frozen in time.
But at the last moment, he froze.
Summoning every ounce of strength, he let out a primal roar—a desperate howl spanning nearly a century.
“Do you see this? This is the world you left behind! If you’d just hanged all those bankers and monopolists on Wall Street back then, none of this would’ve happened!”
His voice echoed through the empty room, cracking with anguish. Exhausted by the effort, he collapsed onto the cold floor, drunk and defeated. As consciousness slipped away, a voice—clear, steady, and imbued with the vintage timbre of old-time radio broadcasts—resonated deep within his mind:
“Young man, hanging them wouldn’t solve anything…”
---
Awareness clawed its way back from the viscous darkness.
Leo’s first sensation was a throbbing headache. His second realization? The voice hadn’t vanished.
As he struggled to distinguish reality from hallucination, the voice resumed, picking up where it had left off before he passed out.
“…but making them serve the people could.”
The words sliced through his hangover like a knife.
Jerking upright, Leo scanned the dimly lit apartment. Empty save for himself, the whiskey bottle lay beside him, and Roosevelt’s poster still hung on the wall, smirking with that infuriating confidence.
“Who?” Leo rasped, his voice hoarse. “Who’s there?”
Silence answered him. A primal fear gripped him as he scrambled to the door—it was locked. Rushing back to the desk, he shook the mouse frantically, waking the computer screen. No signs of remote access, no firewall breaches. He was alone.
“I thought my accent was fairly standard—upstate New York, perhaps?” The voice returned, tinged with aristocratic flair. “Young man, your hospitality leaves much to be desired, though I admit, I am an uninvited guest.”
Leo’s blood ran cold. Logic screamed that this was a hallucination born of stress, alcohol, debt, unemployment—a cruel joke played by life itself. Yet, the voice defied explanation. Unlike typical auditory delusions, it carried directionality, a physical presence resonating in the center of his skull while remaining distinct from his thoughts.
“Who are you?!” he bellowed into the empty room, feeling utterly insane.
“A man who sat in the Oval Office for twelve years, steering this nation.”
The voice replied calmly.
“By the way, you’ve got my portrait hanging on your wall. Though I must say, that photographer made me look far more serious than I actually am—I was quite the charmer.”
Leo’s neck creaked as he turned robotically toward the wall. His eyes locked onto Roosevelt’s poster. Sunlight streamed in at an awkward angle, distorting the familiar face with shadows.
A chill raced up his spine.
He wasn’t talking to a hallucination.
He wasn’t muttering to himself.
He was speaking to a poster.
And damn it, the poster was talking back.
Instead of screaming, Leo bolted into the narrow bathroom, turning on the faucet and splashing icy water onto his face repeatedly. Staring into the mirror, he saw a pale, hollow-eyed reflection staring back.
“Calm down, Leo,” he whispered, teeth chattering. “It’s just stress… unemployment… loans… mixed with alcohol. Acute mental breakdown, yeah, that’s it.”
He needed help. Modern science. A doctor in a white coat prescribing sedatives and advising rest.
Just then, the voice spoke again, almost pityingly. “If seeing a doctor will ease your mind, go ahead. There’s no harm in it—consider it an evening stroll.”
That dismissive remark shattered whatever self-delusion Leo clung to. But paradoxically, it also hardened his resolve.
He had to go.
He had to prove the voice was fake.
He had to expel this arrogant “ghost” trespassing in his mind.
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