Chapter 2: Authorization Required
A few days passed, and a few people at school found out about this thing. Not Felix, mostly students who would meet with me after school. I’d charge them a dollar and make a few requested changes to their phone or computer (or vehicle, in one instance). I was restocking student notebooks between classes and no teachers were ever the wiser. Mr. Brewer had us write up a paper on changing lives and the ramifications of it, and safe to say my exposure in this made for a decent (though unlisted) source of information.
My services had turned enough of a profit to pick up a few Team Fortress items I wanted, and it felt like a good enough thing to do.
One day, in mid-November, Felix showed up to my door, still dressed in his doorman-esque uniform and hat, and handed us a Christmas card. “Well, hello, Ash! You’ve been popular at school lately!”
“I guess you could say I have.”
“So, what’s your secret?”
“What?”
“Is it just being an approachable young lady, or are you bribing them?” he said with a chuckle.
I brushed off his comment, thanked him for the card, and closed the door. I headed back upstairs and picked up the gun, only to find the screen had gone red. “ADMINISTRATOR AUTHORIZATION REQUIRED” was written across the screen. How could this have happened? Did Felix do this? Why did it want this now when I used it for weeks without that? Felix was definitely the reason why. There was no other explanation. I took it out and put it back in, and the screen flashed blue for a moment before going red. I took it out, put it in and then clicked it at something. The screen remained blue. It was a minor hindrance at best, but I could use this to get to the bottom of it all. I planned to take this to the capitol and find out what secrets Felix had.
I headed into the building, and found the building empty. Felix was never at that desk of his for whatever reason, but I chose not to look into that. Perhaps he had an office. He does have a workshop somewhere, but I’m not sure where. I reconnected the device and clicked it at a bookshelf behind the desk. The screen lit up with its contents, but also an on/off selector. Curious, I selected that, and the bookshelf slid away, revealing a staircase. As I descended, I couldn’t help but feel I’d been down here before. Maybe I had a friend who had a basement like this? I dunno. Down there, I saw what I believe is Felix’s workshop.
It was kinda smallish. A workbench, an old computer, a box of computer stuff, some books, papers, and a back wall that was a bunch of full metal shelves. The contents of the boxes was nothing special, just floppy discs (in 2014?), papers, nothing special. This couldn’t be all. As I started to push a shelf out of the way, Felix came from upstairs. “What are you doing down here, Ash? Did I leave the door open?”
“Uh… yeah.”
“Ah. Well, this is the workshop. It’s where the magic happens.”
“Okay then. This is it?”
“This is it.”
“And behind the shelves?
“Oh, nothing much. Say, what’s that?”
Felix pointed to the gun. Shoot, he noticed it.
“Just a prop.”
“…Ah, okay then. Well, you best be off. I have some work to do. Nothing special.”
I walked back home, ultimately disappointed. I let him find out about the gun thing, and then the elusive workshop was nothing big. As I walked out of the door, Felix stopped me. “Oh, Ash?”
“Yeah?”
Felix nodded towards me and replied, “As long as you’re making lives better, I don’t care either way. Just don’t go overboard!”
That was not the response I expected to hear. He knows about this, but won’t do anything about it? He’s craftier than I thought.
The next day, I stopped making upgrades. After a few complaints, everyone continued with what they had. I had earned enough money from it, Felix knew about it, and its actual uses stopped short of being fantastically useful. A couple days later, I found its functionality was even further reduced, and Felix seemed a bit busy. I wonder with what…
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