Work Text:
Harrow blinked at the coffee machine with its bullshit wires, taps, and buttons. Apparently, a regular old pot was too pedestrian for an up-and-coming tech company, so the Talent team had brought in this complicated monstrosity and assumed that their highly technical team could just figure it out.
Instead, it was the greatest challenge of Harrow’s career. She’d call it a lucky day if she managed to get it to spit out something halfway drinkable.
She pressed a button. She waited. The machine made noises like it was going to actually make coffee, but instead it sputtered, hissed, and kindly deposited about half a cup of coffee in the actual mug before it started spraying her.
She bit her lip, toweled herself off, and did the whole thing again to attempt a full cup of coffee, this time stepping back and letting it just spray outwards. She was mopping it up when Coronabeth Tridentarius passed by and gave her a curious look. Harrow shuffled back to her desk with her half-assed garbage brew before anyone could offer to help – infinitely worse than being covered in coffee – and choked it down like the desperate caffeine gremlin she was.
Then she opened up her laptop to the Slack message that ruined her life.
@GideonNav (she/her): Hey I told a customer we have dark mode.
@GideonNav (she/her) : thats ur feature right?
@GideonNav (she/her): I said next release, they wanna sign.
Harrow put down her mug and tried not to scream. Fuck, she hated Sales. She could accept the existence of Sales as a necessary evil to ensure the company actually made money, but she had yet to accept interacting with them as a necessity. And instead of doing their dirty work in private, Sales bros – they were all bros, regardless of gender – loved to sashay around the office, drinking all the free beer and funneling their chaotic energy into cacophonous rounds of ping pong.
Gideon, at least, had the courtesy to work remotely, which saved Harrow a repeat of having to answer Naberius’ inane questions while simultaneously choking on the scent of his hair gel. Gideon existed instead as a spectre of digital frustration, as the totality of their interactions occurred over Slack. Despite their complete lack of in-person interaction, Harrow had still developed a stress response to seeing those stupid little ellipses hovering by Gideon’s name to indicate that another absurd message was incoming.
She took a deep breath and responded.
@Harrowhark: It’s been pushed to next year.
@Harrowhark: And feature requests go in the #product channel, not DMs.
@Harrowhark: And for the last time, I have absolutely no control over the roadmap. Talk to Sextus.
She hoped that Gideon would take the fucking hint.
@GideonNav (she/her): Thanks cutie 😉
Harrow was about to mute Gideon because she had actual work to do, but then the #product channel jumped to the top of her unreads.
@GideonNav (she/her) in #product : hey so @Harrowhark says that we’re getting dark mode next year, can someone pls confirm that’s true? It’s a deal breaker for Mithraeom Industries and there’s a lot of 💸 💸 🤑 on the line
@GideonNav (she/her) in #product: *Mithraeum
@GideonNav (she/her) in #product: @Palamedes — @Harrowhark says you’re in charge of the roadmap, can you smartboy up this feature for me?
Harrow muted the entire channel, which probably wasn’t very synergetic of her or whatever kool aid the exec team wanted her to drink this quarter. She’d told Gideon to talk to Pal, Gideon had talked to Pal, and they could both move on.
Except Gideon seemed fundamentally incapable of ever moving on.
Gideon had swept into Thalergen six months ago, her arrival heralded by an obnoxious intro blurb that Harrow had only noticed because she’d been tagged in the same post.
@DulcieSept in #talent : Happy Monday! We’ve got some things to celebrate:
- Happy birthday to @CamillaHect in Quality Engineering! Enjoy the day off.
- Happy two-year anniversary to Lead Product Designer @Harrowhark! Harrow has led the development of some of our most popular features. We’re still working on getting her out of her shell - @Coronabeth, I sense a webinar? 😉
New Hires:
- @Jeannemary (Sales Development Representative): Jeannemary likes hiking, karaoke, and is training for her first marathon!
- @IsaacTet (Support Hero): Isaac is into science podcasts and musical theatre. He’s not into hiking.
- @GideonNav (Account Executive, Enterprise Sales): Gideon’s favourite place is the gym and she resents sleeves. If she had to be any Avenger, she’d choose Thor.
Harrow had glanced at the post, dismissed Gideon as another generic Sales himbo, and then occupied herself sending a stern message to Dulcie and Corona that she would not be doing any webinars. Except, Gideon’s name had started popping up all. over. Slack.
@GideonNav in #puppers: OMG saw the cutest dog this weekend!
@GideonNav in #memes: /giphy llama dance
@GideonNav in #memes: /giphy it is wednesday my dudes
@GideonNav in #food: found an amazing protein packed curry, recommending to anyone else who hates the fucking taste of whey
@GideonNav in #food: hey sorry Pyrrha talked to me about swearing in public channels. Not that I swear in private channels. Or DMs. But whey is gross.
Two months in, her name started lighting up the #deals channel like a goddamn firework. Harrow muted the channel, because as long as she was doing her job and the company remained profitable enough for her to have one, she didn’t actually care how the sales came in.
It kept coming.
@DulcieSept in #team-bonding : Congrats to this week’s winners of Zoom trivia — @Palamedes @Magnus @GideonNav @IsaacTet!!!
@GideonNav in #music : Made a great workout playlist this weekend — sharing in case anyone needs some motivation for the grind!
@GideonNav in #marketing : Heeeeeey @Coronabeth can you ship some of those hoodies to us remote folks?
@DulcieSept in #announcements: The Culture Hero awards are IN!
- Office Mom goes to @AbigailPent in Professional Services – keep the snacks coming, we love you!
- Office Bestie goes to @Coronabeth in Marketing – your warm smile and great hugs make everyone feel welcome!
- Best Newbie, Remote Culture Hero, and Most Slacktivity goes to @GideonNav in Sales! Even though we’re not in the same place, your online participation brings such a sense of community!
Harrow resented how deeply irritated she’d managed to get over someone who wasn’t even on her team, but at least they’d probably never work together. And then, it happened.
@GideonNav in #product : hey hey I got a customer who’s curious about our accessibility features, who do I talk to?
- @Palamedes: @GideonNav I believe you can consult with @Harrowhark about that!
- @Harrowhark: I believe that you can consult some very thorough articles on our internal wiki.
She’d smiled in brief satisfaction and gone back to combing through her user research when a DM popped up.
@GideonNav : hey did you write that documentation?
@GideonNav : it’s really thorough, I learned a lot
@GideonNav : I have some extra questions about contrast compliance if the customer swaps in their own branding
@Harrowhark: Hello, Gideon. That would depend on if the customer’s branding colours meet WCAG standards. Do you have access to their hex codes?
@GideonNav: is that a type of magic coding? Like, you code with hexes? Or is it like a virus but instead you hex the computer?
Harrow had heaved a massive sigh, because she did not want to explain hex codes to some ridiculous sales bro who would never remember it in the first place. But she needed to at least try , because she was still haunted by the neon hellscape that Naberius Tern had set up for his demos.
@Harrowhark: Here’s a Chrome extension that can help you, and some documentation on hex codes and how to check contrast compliance.
@GideonNav: oh fucking sweet, tysm.
@GideonNav : /giphy thank you
At some point, Gideon decided that Harrow was her own personal support person, despite the fact that they had an entire Support team.
@GideonNav: you’ve got superadmin access right? I’m locked out of this demo environment
@Harrowhark: Have you submitted a support ticket?
@GideonNav: yeah but Isaac took it and he’s still new and can’t figure it out.
@GideonNav: and I don’t wanna make him feel bad
@GideonNav: I’ll talk to Magnus after, just please help me access this environment for this demo 🙏🙏🙏
@Harrowhark: Fine.
@GideonNav: I saved the password, not sure what’s wrong
@Harrowhark: We have Single Sign On. You should be able to use your regular password.
@GideonNav: OH gotcha.
@GideonNav: omg lmao I accidentally saved my tinder password
@GideonNav: Thanks for hooking me up, Empress of Edge Cases.
Two hours later, she got a notification that Gideon had yet again tagged her in a public channel.
@GideonNav (she/her) in #shoutouts: Big thank you to @NaberiusTern for pinch hitting last minute on this Trident Sports demo! You saved the day and the customers loved you - think we’ve got a lot of potential with this one. Also thanks to @Harrowhark for helping me sort out some last minute access issues – team work makes the dream work!
Something about that was off. Harrow took a deep breath, and for the first time, she voluntarily messaged Gideon.
@Harrowhark: How did the demo go?
@GideonNav (she/her): uhhhh not the greatest.
@GideonNav (she/her): for me at least
@GideonNav (she/her): customer was a fucking tool
@GideonNav (she/her): they assumed I was a guy and then when I got on the call, they were…weird.
@GideonNav (she/her): and they said they were looking for someone they could talk to about sports, and I was like, that’s great, I love sports! Big big fan of women’s soccer.
@GideonNav (she/her): and they said they wanted someone who knew more about “mainstream sports”
@GideonNav (she/her): and i didn’t wanna throw the deal so I just DMed Naberius and he jumped on the call
@GideonNav (she/her): and they LOVED him. Such fucking bullshit.
@GideonNav (she/her): sorry for swearing, Pyrrha said DMs are okay
Harrow sat back in her seat and realized abruptly that she didn’t know anything about Gideon. She’d gleaned from various posts that she was a gym rat, a horrendous extrovert, and – especially after that women’s soccer reference – very likely queer. Harrow could relate to literally one of those things. She’d seen Gideon pop up in company-wide Zoom meetings, but she characteristically had her camera off, and her profile picture was… a sword.
(“Oh yeah,” Jeannemary had explained, when Harrow had inquired why Gideon never had her camera on. “She works out during the day and she told me that she likes to um, marinate with her shirt off after.” Harrow had wrinkled her nose and added to the list of reasons to dislike Gideon.)
@Harrowhark: I’m so sorry that happened to you. It’s complete bullshit that a customer would be that blatantly misogynist in this day and age.
@GideonNav (she/her): I mean it happens.
@GideonNav (she/her): Like, sales is still pretty bro-y
@GideonNav (she/her) : And I can play along, but if someone comes in with a bias, there’s nothing I can do about that
@GideonNav (she/her): it got escalated to Pyrrha tho
@Harrowhark: I’d love to hear how the call goes with Pyrrha. She’ll rip them a new one.
@GideonNav (she/her): 💯💯💯
@GideonNav (she/her): all I can do is throw my pronouns all over the place like fucking confetti so I don’t have to deal with this again.
@Harrowhark: You could also add a profile picture.
@GideonNav (she/her): yeah but swords are cool
@GideonNav (she/her): and I’m pretty butch so they’ll probably still get it wrong
@GideonNav (she/her): onwards and upwards
@GideonNav (she/her): fuck the haters and all that jazz.
Queerness confirmed. Harrow tapped her fingers on her desk, pondering what to say.
@Harrowhark: Fuck the haters, indeed.
@GideonNav (she/her): 😉😉😉
And it snowballed from there. Mostly, Gideon would ask Harrow tedious product questions that she absolutely could have posted in #product. Sometimes, they’d talk about work, but there were certain phrases that prompted a brutal ache in the front of Harrow’s cranium.
@GideonNav (she/her): hey i need something for an RFP
@Harrowhark: TALK. TO. IANTHE.
@GideonNav (she/her): Ugh no ianthe sucks
Harrow tapped her fingers on her desk, because she didn’t disagree, but unlike some people, she at least liked to retain the ruse of professionalism.
@Harrowhark: I understand your objection, but she has access to the database of RFP responses, which I do not.
@GideonNav (she/her): You mean I don’t get a custom Harrowhark response? 😉
@Harrowhark: Buy our product. It helps you manage tasks. We have dark mode coming sometime.
@Harrowhark: You see, there’s a reason I don’t do webinars.
@GideonNav (she/her): LOL gotcha.
Then, things were quiet for a while, and Harrow went back to her usual routine, which primarily involved her daily battle with the espresso machine, submitting dev tickets to ensure their product met accessibility requirements, and delegating all the people work to Sextus. Then her phone started blowing up with Slack messages as soon as she parked her car.
@Pash: HARROW DID YOU TELL A CUSTOMER WE HAVE DARK MODE COMING THIS QUARTER.
@Harrowhark: I don’t talk to customers outside of UX research.
@Pash: I DON’T HAVE ENOUGH DEVS FOR THIS SHIT HARROW
@Pash: I FUCKING TOLD FUCKING PALAMEDES WE COULDN’T GET IT IN THIS RELEASE
They went back and forth and Harrow felt herself fuming as she made her way into the office, pocketing her phone for a minute of peace in the elevator. The doors were just about to close when an arm thrust into the elevator and pushed hard against the doors, wrenching them open.
Harrow was met with a rather tall woman in a button-up, face contorted in an absurd crooked smile. She had a disheveled crop of red hair that flopped over tea-gold eyes, and her shirt seemed to be straining over some impressive muscle. She was attractive in a way that was slightly discomforting, and Harrow felt her breath unwillingly hitch.
“I’m so glad I can still do that,” she declared, and then her eyes caught Harrow. She looked momentarily surprised, and then gave Harrow a very clear once-over, raising an eyebrow. Harrow felt a curious heat building in her chest at this brazen inspection, and her heart stuttered to the realization that this was a fucking meet-cute. Harrowhark Nonagesimus did not do meet-cutes in elevators with attractive muscled redheads. She gathered her wits.
“It’s a marvel,” supplied Harrow, “considering that this is the last trip this elevator was ever destined to take. Without you forcing the door open, you’d be stuck in this parking garage forever.”
The woman snorted and stepped in, pressing the 9 button that Harrow had already selected. “Lucky me, then,” she said, and leaned back against the elevator wall. Harrow let herself look again – fuck, she was attractive, and Harrow absolutely didn’t have time for this. She had to get to her desk and deal with the fact that Gideon fucking Nav had decided to overpromise on Harrow’s feature and put her in the line of fire with Pash.
The elevator dinged, and the woman gave a sweeping after you gesture with her hand for Harrow to step out. The woman followed her, a half-step behind, to the Thalergen offices. Once they were through the glass doors – which she had, of course, held open while Harrow fobbed them in – she gave Harrow a wink and turned left when Harrow went right.
She’d barely gotten her laptop set up – 14 notifications from Pash in 3 different threads; she was very tempted to mute all of them and throw in a ⛔ status for good measure – when Palamedes rolled his chair over to her desk.
“Hey,” he said, “can we chat? Because I just had a very interesting series of Slack conversations about how a certain feature commitment somehow made it into the Mithraeum proposal.”
“Oh shit,” said Harrow.
“Harrow,” Palamedes said slowly, “did you tell Gideon she could tell Mithraeum that we had dark mode coming?”
“I told her to talk to Ianthe!” Harrow exclaimed, and then sighed. “And then I mentioned it but as a joke, because there’s a reason I don’t deal with RFPs. No one in their right mind would have actually put it in there.”
“And yet,” he said, “Gideon Nav managed, so take of that what you will.” He leaned forward. “Mithraeum’s a big customer, and after some uh, creative resourcing, I was able to work with Pash to prioritize it for the next release.”
Harrow looked at him. “You’re fucking kidding.”
Palamedes raised an eyebrow. “No, I think you were, which is what got us in this pickle.”
Harrow leaned back in her chair with a groan, and covered her eyes. “Gideon should have known it was a joke.”
“Well, that’s Pyrrha’s concern to deal with. My role is to make sure it happens. Your role is to help Gideon support the customer so that they have a positive impression of the feature.”
“It’s dark mode,” Harrow lamented. “It’s the exact same interface, except it’s dark.”
“Don’t sell yourself short,” Palamedes chided, and she glared at him.
“Fine,” she relented. “What’s involved?”
He smiled wryly. “I’m going to set up a meeting with Pyrrha and Gideon to strategize. I’ll handle Pash so that she stops yelling at you – I think something might be wrong with her keyboard, because all her messages are capitalized.”
“That’s just how she is,” Harrow sighed, and resigned herself to the feature sprint from hell.
***
@Palamedes created the channel #project-mithraeum .
@Palamedes invited @GideonNav (she/her), @PyrrhaDve, @Harrowhark, @CamillaHect, and @Pash.
@Palamedes in #project-mithraeum: Starting this channel so that we have a dedicated place to communicate about the new dark mode feature as it relates to Mithraeum as a prospective customer. Technical conversations will continue to take place in #going-dark, though I would prefer it be renamed #feature-dark-mode in alignment with established channel naming conventions.
@Pash in #project-mithraeum : No fucking way. I’m building this feature, I’m naming this channel whatever the hell I want. You’re just lucky I didn’t name it #heart-of-darkness.
@Palamedes in #project-mithraeum: Moving on, I’d like to book a meeting for next Thursday. @GideonNav (she/her), during the best time for most of us, you have a blocker that says “Get Swole.” Are you able to move this?
@GideonNav (she/her) in #project-mithraeum: oh shit
@GideonNav (she/her) in #project-mithraeum: I thought that was private
@GideonNav (she/her) in #project-mithraeum: yeah I can move that.
@GideonNav (she/her) in #project-mithraeum: You can’t see any of the stuff I have in the evenings can you?
@Palamedes in #project-mithraeum: Being as that is outside of your work hours, I see no reason to check.
@Pash in #project-mithraeum: Checking now.
@Pash in #project-mithraeum: AHAHAHAHA YOU LOSER.
@Palamedes in #project-mithraeum:: Meeting booked. See you all next week.
***
The meeting was, of course, hybrid.
As Harrow had expected, Gideon had her camera off, which left her, Palamedes, Pash, Camilla, and Pyrrha in a Zoom room staring at a 50-inch TV screen that just read @GideonNav (she/her). And it was completely silent.
“Gideon,” asked Pyrrha slowly, “can you hear us?”
A chat popped up on the screen.
Yeah sorry. I’ve got contractors in my house and it’s super noisy. I want to spare you guys from this garbage auditory experience.
“Much appreciated,” said Palamedes, “should we reschedule? Or just sort it out via Slack?”
Nah it’s fine. You guys talk and I’ll chime in as needed. I’m a fast typer. It’s bad enough that I have to deal with it, don’t want to pass on the shit stick.
Pyrrha where does this meeting land on the swear-o-meter?
They all turned to look at Pyrrha. “Pash is in the meeting, so like an eleven?”
“Fucking right,” said Pash, just as Gideon typed hell yeah, let’s go motherfuckers.
Palamedes raised an eyebrow. “I’m deeply curious about this swear-o-meter, but we have business to attend to.”
Pyrrha shrugged. “We save good behaviour for when it matters. Customer calls are a zero; most internal meetings are a five; Sales channels are a seven.”
My DM with Pyrrha is a 10 😀, Gideon chatted.
“Okay,” continued Pash. “So we’re all on board for Operation Get Dark Mode in this Fucking Release, which is unfortunately too long a name for a Slack channel.”
“Catchy,” added Camilla.
“I think it needs work,” said Palamedes, “but we can sort that out offline.”
I hate that phrase, typed Gideon. It’s a hybrid workforce with cloud-based software. Nothing we do is offline.
“Fine,” said Palamedes. “We’ll sort that out over Slack.” He gave a deep sigh, and then looked between Harrow and the TV screen that read Gideon Nav (she/her). “You two decided to have some cute little slack thing that made it into a proposal—“
“—And it’s landing us a very big deal,” Pyrrha emphasized. “I’m very glad we could all work together to make this happen.”
“Tell that to my fucking devs,” Pash mumbled. “Harrow, how close are you to having user stories ready for the tickets?”
Harrow was silent for a moment. “I still have some accessibility checks to do, and we need additional documentation for Services on checking customer colours.”
“I’ll get Judith in it,” replied Palamedes, and he pulled up a roadmap. “Harrow, Pash — figure out how to build this into the upcoming sprints. Camilla, work with Harrow so that your team can take on some of the accessibility checks. He looked around the room, and was met with a shrug (Camilla), “fucking great” (Pash), and a tight-lipped nod (Harrow).
“I’m so glad we got this A-team together,” Palamedes continued drily. “Pyrrha, Gideon — what do we need to sign Mithraeum other than get dark mode in the next release?”
They want proof, typed Gideon. Um, Jeannemary referenced the roadmap and kind of contradicted what I said.
“Because what you said was a lie,” Harrow jabbed. “At least someone was doing their job properly.”
I’m very good at my job, typed Gideon.
“I am, too!” shouted Harrow.
“I’m so glad of both those things,” Pyrrha declared, “and very excited to see you two all-stars work more closely together.”
“What,” said Harrow blankly.
They asked for some proof of concept. And they want a demo before they sign.
“Okay, fine,” Harrow relented. She turned to Pash and Camilla. “Can we get Nav a demo environment on beta after config freeze?” She took a deep breath. “It’s mostly complex on the back end, but users will just have a switch to toggle. I can also send some interactive mock-ups in advance.”
“That’s a great start,” Pyrrha commented, and Harrow looked around the room blankly.
“There’s something you're not telling me,” said Harrow slowly.
They want a demo with the lead product designer on this feature.
“No,” insisted Harrow. “I don’t do demos. I don’t do webinars.”
“That’s fine,” noted Pyrrha. “They want it in person.”
“This has to be fake,” said Harrow. “There has to be some absurd joke in there. They want a demo. In person. Of me sliding a toggle that says ‘Enable Dark Mode?’”
If you could click around a bit that would be great as well.
“I don’t even know what to say,” Harrow responded, after a while.
“I’m sure you’ll figure it out,” smiled Palamedes. “All right. I’ll set up a project board for us to all track this cross-functionally, and I think we’ve got an action plan.”
Thanks dark mistress, typed Gideon, and Harrow wished that Gideon had been on camera so that she could glare daggers at her stupid face. She decided to pick a fight with the coffee machine instead.
***
@GideonNav (she/her): I liked the sweater you were wearing in the meeting.
@Harrowhark: What the actual fuck, Nav?
@GideonNav (she/her): whoa, are you pushing our convo up on the swear-o-meter? I’m into it.
@Harrowhark: You’re completely bulldozing the roadmap. You’re forcing me to not only be on a customer call, but to travel in person to a customer and make a presentation. And your reaction is to compliment my outfit?
@GideonNav (she/her): right yeah sorry. I need to get better at complimenting women on more than their physical appearance.
@GideonNav (she/her): You’re a very good product designer and we’re gonna kick this demo’s ass.
@Harrowhark: I cannot believe you’re in a customer-facing role.
***
@Pash changed the channel #going-dark to #embrace-the-dark-side
@Pash in #embrace-the-dark-side: @Harrowhark you have five fucking days to get me those user stories or I’m calling this whole shit off.
@Harrowhark in #embrace-the-dark-side : Threats aren’t very synergetic of you, Pash.
@Pash in #embrace-the-dark-side: 🖕🖕🖕
***
Harrow’s head hurt, and her eyes felt blurry. She was tired of staring at the same damn thing, of combing through every possible interface in search of elements that might not be compliant with dark mode. She needed a damn coffee.
The coffee machine, of course, was being a stupid little bitch.
“Here, there’s a trick to it,” said a voice, and Harrow looked up to see the redhead from the other day, wearing another well-fitted button-up and slacks. Harrow felt her face go warm, and told herself it was just the steam from the espresso machine that decided to blow up in her face.
The woman looked at her, raising an eyebrow, and Harrow finally stepped aside. She watched as the other woman started fiddling with various touch screen settings.
“It’s cursed,” bemoaned Harrow. “It’s determined to fuck with my day and deny me caffeine.”
“Maybe it senses the mutual animosity.” The woman fiddled with a knob on the side of the machine. “You should try being nicer to it. What do you want?”
“For the Sales department to be sent to an island where I never have to deal with any of them again,” Harrow grumbled, and the woman laughed.
“I can’t help with that, unfortunately, but I can make you an americano.” She smiled at Harrow. “I was a barista in college.”
“I’m glad it prepared you for the intense responsibility of working at Thalergen,” responded Harrow. The woman winked at her, and then she went to work.
Harrow watched her hands for a moment — they were nice hands, clever and agile — and then the woman turned back to her. She felt rather than saw the woman’s gaze span her body, prompting a sudden burst of insecurity at how dressed down she was in her jeans, t-shirt, and oversized sweater, but there was something oddly appreciative about the woman’s gaze. “Let me guess,” the woman smiled, “you take it black?”
“One packet of sugar,” replied Harrow, slightly stunned.
The woman winked at her again. “So you do have a sweet side.”
“I —“ Harrow was silent for a moment, taking in how strange it was to be flirted with. She shook it off — this woman was a stranger, and some level of coworker. “I wouldn’t say that exactly,” she noted, then, “Thank you.”
“Any time,” said the woman with a grin, and she handed Harrow the mug, their hands brushing briefly. “I know things are pretty busy in Product these days.”
Then she turned around and left. It took Harrow a moment to realize she’d never mentioned working in Product.
***
@GideonNav (she/her) in #project-mithraeum: hey @Harrowhark do we have any customer-facing documentation on our accessibility compliance?
@Harrowhark in #project-mithraeum: Product Marketing owns customer-facing content for prospective customers. Tagging @Coronabeth.
***
It became some kind of ritual. Harrow would show up, put her stuff down, make her way over to the espresso machine, frown at it, and then the tall redhead would appear, do some kind of wizardry on the machine, give that crooked smile, and hand Harrow a phenomenal cup of coffee.
And then, suddenly, she didn’t. It was fine, Harrow told herself. She was just some random woman from another department — fuck, Harrow didn’t even know her name . Maybe she was just a contractor, or some figment of Harrow’s imagination to deal with all the stress. She went back to fighting with the coffee machine.
***
@GideonNav (she/her) in #project-mithraeum: great news — they loved the mock-up screenshots that @Harrowhark shared! They’re hoping to sign after the demo and then launch a few weeks after the release.
@Harrowhark in #project-mithraeum: Nav, that’s an incredibly tight timeline. Neither of us needs more tension from Services.
@Palamedes in #project-mithraeum: Let’s all keep calm. I’ll pull in Abigail and see what we can do.
@Palamedes added @AbigailPent to #project-mithraeum
@AbigailPent in #project-mithraeum: Just catching up.
@AbigailPent in #project-mithraeum : Absolutely not.
@AbigailPent in #project-mithraeum: We can kick off right after the release, but we cannot launch on a three week timeline like @GideonNav (she/her) is suggesting.
@GideonNav (she/her) in #project-mithraeum: yeah that’s what I said. They want to launch their implementation right after the release.
@Palamedes in #project-mithraeum: @GideonNav (she/her) please tell me you know that kickoff and launch are different things.
@GideonNav (she/her) in #project-mithraeum: oh I thought they were just synonyms
@GideonNav (she/her) in #project-mithraeum: whoops my bad
@AbigailPent in #project-mithraeum : Kickoff is the beginning of an implementation. Launch is when a customer goes live, also known as the end of an implementation.
@AbigailPent in #project-mithraeum : @PyrrhaDve can you make sure that Sales onboarding covers the implementation cycle so that we can align our messaging and customer expectations?
Harrow blinked at the screen and felt a headache coming on. She muted the channel for the rest of the day.
The next few days were blessedly quiet – she kept up with her accessibility audit, noting changes in the tickets. There were almost concerningly few messages from Gideon – not just in their chats, but anywhere – and when she looked at her Slack profile, her status was set to 📦 ON THE MOVE. It should have felt like a relief.
She blinked at her computer, which was highlighting a glaring issue that would involve even more dev time to fix. “Fuck,” she muttered. She’d have to talk to Pash, which would involve more caffeine than she currently had in her system.
When Harrow had started her career in tech, she’d known the stereotypes – beer fridges, tedious catch phrases and attempts at team bonding, free hoodies. For the most part, they were all tolerable. Except for ping pong.
Ping pong was like catnip for the most annoying kinds of people, who all felt a need to scream while slapping a plastic ball around. She gathered her courage and made her way to the kitchen, where Naberius Tern was grouchily standing with his paddle tucked under his arms. Standing across from him, grinning and in a fighting stance, was the redheaded woman. She was wearing a green short-sleeved button-up this time, and her arms were – wow. Harrow shook her head free of the distraction, and made her way over to the hot water tap, pulling out a tea bag.
A panting noise crept up behind her, and she jolted momentarily. The redhead was standing behind her, game abandoned with a grin on her face. “You survived without me,” she said brightly.
“At the end of the day, it’s all caffeine,” Harrow noted, but she let herself smile a little.
The woman gave a warm smile. “Can I make you something?”
“Um,” said Harrow, “maybe tomorrow? It’s just tea.”
“I can make you a London fog,” the redhead said quickly. She seemed a little antsy. “Please? I need to apply my talents somewhere.”
“Fine,” Harrow relented, and she watched the woman work. She handed Harrow a mug, and Harrow took a sip. “It’s good. Are you – are you new?”
“Kind of?” She raised her arm, and scratched the back of her head a little. Harrow tried not to look too closely. She had enough going on not to add in an office crush.
“I’ve um, gotta get back,” she said. “I’ve got a Slack conversation I’m dreading.”
The woman winced. “Godspeed, then.” She saluted Harrow with two fingers, and grinned.
***
@DulcieSept in #talent: TEAM BONDING ANNOUNCEMENT! We’ll be holding a PING PONG TOURNAMENT for office folks - react with a ✅ to sign up!! Brackets will be announced next week.
The next week, the wall by the ping pong table became dominated by a giant whiteboard, mapped out to include some kind of sports bracket. Harrow purchased noise canceling headphones and expensed them, only sparing a glance as the brackets kept moving forward.
***
Harrow crossed her arms and flattened herself against the wall, sipping the most inoffensive seltzer she could dig out of the beer fridge. Mandatory fun time, they called it. Step away from your desk at 3 p.m. to drink and play insipid games. She’d tried to avoid it, but Sextus of all people had made the case that this was key interdepartmental networking, which didn’t do much to enhance the appeal.
“Hey,” she heard, and the redheaded woman was standing next to her. She always had that disconcerting asymmetrical grin. She gave Harrow a strange look up and down. “I like your dress.”
“Oh,” said Harrow. Her outfit hadn’t seemed anything special when she’d gotten ready that morning – just an oversized t-shirt dress with the outline of a ribcage across her chest and chunky black boots.
“You hate this stuff, don’t you?” the woman guessed, and Harrow let out a sigh of relief.
“So much,” Harrow admitted. “I like the work. The rest is… superfluous.”
The woman shrugged. “Maybe you just haven’t given it a chance.”
“I’ve been here over two years,” Harrow said. “The novelty wears off.”
“Yeah, I know,” the woman said, and Harrow felt her mouth open slightly when she saw Pash come up and shout, “YO, CUZ – you fucking playing or what?”
The woman flipped her off. “Be right there, douchebag!”
Harrow’s brow creased. “Pash is your cousin?”
“Oh yeah,” the redhead grinned. “She referred me, actually.” She leaned into Harrow slightly, and Harrow felt her breath catch. “I’d offer to buy you a drink, but they’re kind of free.”
Before Harrow could respond, a lot of things happened all at once.
“For fuck’s sake, asswipe,” yelled Pash, “stop flirting with your fucking coworker and get your ass over here, G–”
“Office is a three!” shouted Pyrrha from across the room.
“Ping pong is a six!” shouted the redhead.
And then the lights suddenly went out, and a rising chorus started to sing.
Happy birthday to Corona
Happy birthday to Coronabeth
Happy birthday, dear Coronabeth
(“And also Ianthe!” shouted Coronabeth.)
Happy birthday to you
Harrow was pulled out of whatever reverie she’d fallen into, blinking as everything faded. “Come get some cake!” Corona announced, and everyone swarmed.
***
@Pash changed the channel #embrace-the-dark-side to #oh-hi-dark
@Pash in #oh-hi-dark : Good news, motherfuckers – the code merged successfully! A few weeks until code freeze, but it looks like smooth sailing.
@Pash in #oh-hi-dark : As much as I resent saying this – good fucking job @Harrowhark.
@GideonNav (she/her) in #oh-hi-dark : 👏👏👏
@GideonNav (she/her) in #oh-hi-dark: Let’s schedule this fucking demoooooo!
@Harrowhark in #oh-hi-dark: Right, my suffering continues. My calendar’s up to date.
@Palamedes changed the channel #oh-hi-dark to #feature-dark-mode
@Pash changed the channel #feature-dark-mode to #r-u-afraid-of-the-dark
***
Harrow arrived at the office to an iced Americano and a giant banner indicating that ping pong finals were today. The centre of the bracket read GIDEON <> CAMILLA in massive red letters. She blinked at it. Somehow, Gideon was in the office, and apparently winning at ping pong.
@DulcieSept in #talent: PING PONG FINALS TODAY! Come to the kitchen at 4 p.m. to watch the EPIC SHOWDOWN between @GideonNav (she/her) and @CamillaHect.
Harrow forgot about it, or at least told herself that she did. She pulled her headphones off at 4:15 to stretch, and then heard the most intense shout reverberate through the office.
“YES YES FUCKING YES! I’M THE MOTHERFUCKING CHAMPION, BITCHES.”
She heard Pyrrha shout, “Kitchen is a three!” and a raw, enthusiastic voice shout back, “WINNING PINGPONG IS A FUCKING NINE.”
Fuck it, she thought, pulling herself out of her seat. Gideon had been a thorn in her side for almost a year, and she’d be lying if there wasn’t some level of curiosity around what Gideon was actually like beyond her tedious Slack presence.
And as she turned the corner to the kitchen, there was her own personal redheaded barista, dressed in tennis shorts and a polo with a sweatband around her head, doing the most absurd victory dance. “SUCK IT, CAM!” she boomed, and Camilla laughed, giving her a friendly punch on the arm. Harrow’s heart pounded, and suddenly all the pieces worked together in her mind.
“You’re fucking lucky you’re the top sales person, Gideon,” said Pyrrha, and Harrow stared at the redhead – Gideon, what the fuck, how was this happening – and finally, their gazes aligned. Gideon stopped her dance, and smiled warmly at Harrow, as if nothing was wrong.
“You–” said Harrow. “You work remotely. You’re supposed to work remotely.”
“I did,” said Gideon, looking right at her. “I moved.” She reached up and scratched her head, that endearing motion that Harrow had been using as an excuse to admire her arms for weeks. She took a few steps closer to Harrow, and Harrow’s heart pounded fiercely. It was confusing and overwhelming and fucked up – the same reaction she’d had to this woman for weeks, somehow immune to the horrific realization that she’d unknowingly had the hots for Gideon fucking Nav.
“I need to get back to work,” she said hollowly, and she turned to hustle back to her desk.
“Shit,” she heard Gideon say, and before she knew it, the other woman had caught up with her. Harrow tried to focus her gaze, tried to take this whole person in as the same Gideon Nav who bugged her for product info on Slack and then still got most of it wrong. She took in the ridiculous tennis outfit, the red hair flopping out over her sweat band, the boyishly handsome face.
“What,” snapped Harrow, “the actual fuck. You knew. You knew and you just — made me coffee and — and flirted with me like you weren’t also the person to throw my entire plan for this quarter into the dumpster because you don’t have a filter between internal banter and customer communication!”
“I know,” Gideon murmured. “I know.” She paused. “It’s not like me relocating was a secret, you know — they announced in #sales and #office-chat. I figured you’d catch on eventually. And in the meantime… I liked making you coffee.”
“I’ve muted both those channels,” Harrow replied sharply. “You still could have told me — that meeting, you had your camera off and muted, like the whole meeting was a joke —were you just in a meeting room trying to fuck with me?”
“No,” said Gideon. “My house was genuinely a disaster and there were genuinely contractors there making a shit ton of noise. Long story, but my old guardian died and I was in charge of her estate — I’ve been going back and forth to fix up her house and sell my old place. That’s the whole reason I was even working remotely to start with. I was already planning to move here permanently, but y’know, renovations...”
“I don’t even know what to say,” said Harrow. “This is why I hate Sales — you’re all so manipulative, anything to get the deal. Which is exactly how we got in this whole fucking situation to begin with!”
Gideon was silent for a moment. Harrow looked at her, and then she looked in the direction of her desk. The kitchen was overflowing with chatter, and all Harrow wanted was to get the fuck out. “Go back to your victory party, Nav.” She kept her voice hard and even. “I’ll see you on Slack.”
Gideon’s expression tightened, and she looked for a moment like she was going to say something, then thought better. She gave a firm, curt nod, and turned around to walk away.
***
@Gideon Nav (she/her): hey so I need to move the demo to after lunch
@Gideon Nav (she/her): they’re flying in that morning.
@GideonNav (she/her): same date tho
@GideonNav (she/her): hope that’s ok
@Harrowhark: Updates on this initiative should go in the #project-mithraeum channel, not DMs.
@Harrowhark: But I have no competing commitments.
@GideonNav (she/her): also they want a presentation on the accessibility features
@Harrowhark: This can also be communicated in #project-mithraeum.
@GideonNav (she/her): Harrow
@GideonNav (she/her): can we talk?
Harrow’s throat tightened. She wanted this whole damn thing over with, to just go back to her research and mock-ups. She hated Gideon for making her resent a feature she’d put so much fucking effort into, but even more, she hated that she missed the days where a random office crush had made her feel better about all of it.
@Harrowhark: I’m quite busy, as I now have to prepare a presentation.
@GideonNav (she/her): yeah but you’re brilliant.
@GideonNav (she/her): Can we please just talk?
@Harrowhark: I believe this counts as “talking” in today’s hybrid world of work. Anything you need to communicate professionally can be done in relevant channels.
@GideonNav (she/her): wow. okay.
***
So now she had to do a presentation. At the least it made Harrow feel slightly better about the fact that three people were flying into head office to watch her slide a toggle.
@CamillaHect in #r-u-afraid-of-the-dark: QE testing’s still going, but things are looking good — @Harrowhark @GideonNav (she/her) your demo environment is good to go.
@GideonNav (she/her) in #r-u-afraid-of-the-dark: oh fucking sweet!
Harrow logged in to the demo environment. She’d seen the the feature on Alpha (@Pash: Here’s your fucking toggle, hope you’re happy.), but this felt different. She sucked in her breath, opened the settings, toggled the feature, and clicked her fucking face off.
@Harrowhark in #r-u-afraid-of-the-dark: @CamillaHect it’s perfect.
@GideonNav (she/her) in #r-u-afraid-of-the-dark: @Harrowhark isn’t it just the same interface, but dark?
@Harrowhark in #r-u-afraid-of-the-dark: @GideonNav (she/her) I believe the words are “Thank you for helping me hit quota, Harrow. I’m sorry I fibbed in that proposal.”
@PyrrhaDve in #r-u-afraid-of-the-dark: Congrats, everyone! I’m glad we have such a wonderful, collaborative team.
@Palamedes in #r-u-afraid-of-the-dark: Moving the business convo to #project-mithraeum. @Pash, please update the channel name to reflect established naming conventions.
@Pash changed the channel name from #r-u-afraid-of-the-dark to #darkest-dark-by-anish-kapoor
@Pash in #darkest-dark-by-anish-kapoor: Don’t fuck with my channel names, Sextus.
@Palamedes in #project-mithraeum: As per the post in #darkest-dark-by-anish-kapoor – a phrase that I deeply resent having to write – the demo environment is now good to go. @AbigailPent where are we at on the Statement of Work?
@AbigailPent in #project-mithraeum: We’re scoping right now. I’d like to note that their current processes are… very immature. It’s going to be quite a rather lengthy and pricey implementation.
@GideonNav (she/her) in #project-mithraeum: oh yeah they’re a total shitshow. They’ve got the money tho. Did you know it was actually inbound? One of the VPs emailed me and legit said “We need a better system!!!! Our CEO is saving all his project plans locally in Word documents and I need to email him every time he makes a change!!”
@GideonNav (she/her) in #project-mithraeum: feel kinda bad for whichever implementation specialist is gonna get stuck working with Mercy tho
***
A week before the demo, Harrow arrived at the office to a full, hot mug of coffee on her desk, accompanied by a sticky note.The handwriting wasn’t familiar, but she knew instantly who it was from.
NOT POISON
(I SWEAR)
She heaved a deep sigh. She considered taking it back to the kitchen and throwing the whole mess down the sink on principle, but the coffee machine had been especially ornery lately, like it was determined to punish her. And Gideon made really, really good coffee.
She drank it, but resented it the whole time.
***
@GideonNav (she/her): Hey what are you wearing to the demo
@Harrowhark: Nav. Are you seriously asking me this?
@GideonNav (she/her): just that they might want us to dress up
@GideonNav (she/her): no offense to your cozy sweaters
@Harrowhark : Please trust that I own business casual and stop approaching me with such insipid conversation topics.
@Harrowhark: Do you have anything to discuss about the actual demo?
@GideonNav (she/her): how do I book a meeting room?
Harrow wanted to scream. How could a woman be so successful in her career and yet so completely inept?
Instead, she sucked in her breath and forwarded Gideon the documentation that Dulcie had lovingly prepared on how to book meeting rooms.
The coffee kept coming. Harrow kept drinking it. They planned the demo over Slack, and she’d occasionally spot Gideon in the office, tearing her own gaze away any time she caught Gideon’s disappointed expression.
Gideon never said anything about it over Slack.
***
Despite her assertion that she knew how to dress up, it had taken Harrow longer than she wanted to admit to choose an outfit. Her choice was probably still inadequate — a black tie-neck blouse; wide-leg gray plaid trousers with a cropped hem, lace-up boots. She’d finessed her makeup more times than she could count, fluffed her hair into some semblance of professionalism.
Fuck you, she thought. I can do business casual.
Gideon wasn’t there the whole morning. Harrow counted down the hours, then minutes. The day felt like it was taking forever. She ate lunch quietly at her desk, careful to avoid any crumbs on her shirt.
Fifteen minutes before, there was still no sign of Gideon. She made her way over to the meeting room, set up her laptop, and waited.
Finally, chatter burst through from the elevator, and Gideon stepped out, holding the door for two women and a man.
Gideon was wearing a goddamn suit and tie. It fit her immaculately, a snappy blue-grey over a crisp white shirt, navy tie hanging perfectly over her chest. She had a fucking tie clip.
“That really was a wonderful lunch,” said the man. He looked so painfully ordinary. “Normally business lunches are so pretentious, but I love a good burger.”
“And no left beef on the table,” said Gideon jovially, and he laughed.
One of the women had a permanently sour expression, and the other let out a delighted little chuckle, leaning towards Gideon. Her hand brushed the sleeve of Gideon’s jacket.
Of course. Of course this was part of it — the electric charisma that Sales could turn on and off at will. Gideon was radiating it out her ears like she was on stage. Harrow sucked her breath in through her teeth, her heart pounding. She hadn’t goddamn prepared for any of this – for this dapper, gregarious version of Gideon; for customers with their needs and particularities and stupid jokes.
Gideon held the meeting room door open for all of them, a huge grin on her face. Harrow stood to greet them.
“John, Mercy, Cytherea — this is Harrowhark Nonagesimus, lead product designer and accessibility consultant on the features we’ll be showing today. Harrow, this is John, Mercymorn, and Cytherea from Mithraeum Industries — they’re excited to see what we’ve built.” Gideon winked at her. “Team work makes the dream work, you know?”
Harrow reached out and shook their hands in turn, feeling suddenly choked up and nervous. She stood there awkwardly while Gideon showed them all to their seats. Gideon landed at Harrow’s side, and Harrow felt a broad hand span the small of her back. Her breath hitched. “You’re gonna do great,” Gideon whispered, and Harrow swallowed and let herself nod. “Just sit down – I’ll be right back.”
Harrow sat down, and felt her heart pound as Gideon zoomed out of the room. Her gaze was tempted to drift in Gideon’s direction, and she fought it back to her room, staring at the gathered customers.
“She’s something, isn’t she?” said the woman in green – Cytherea, Harrow remembered. She nodded, and choked out, “One of our best.”
Cytherea smiled. “She’s been such a gem throughout the whole process – we’ve had to drag John tooth and nail through exploring a new project management tool. And we deeply appreciate how transparent Thalergen has been with sharing your progress to ensure that your solution meets our needs.”
Harrow bit back It’s the same fucking interface, except dark, and said, “Thank you.” She paused, trying to remember what would make sense to say next. “I’m excited that you could make it here for us to share our work with you.”
“She’s so humble.” Harrow turned to see Gideon standing in the doorway, holding an actual tray loaded with a pitcher of water, five water glasses, and a lone mug. She set all of it down in the centre of the table, and then put the mug in front of Harrow. “You know what they say about product people needing their caffeine, huh?”
John laughed with Gideon, despite the fact that Harrow had never heard anyone make that particular quip. But there was a perfect Americano in front of her, her laptop was hooked up, and Gideon was next to her, legs spread wide and powerful in a way that brushed her knee against Harrow’s.
She took up so much space, Harrow realized. The way she leaned forward on the table, the way her laugh filled the room. The way her winks at Harrow from across the kitchen made the whole office feel like it had narrowed down to just the two of them, like everything else had been sucked out by a vacuum. The way she sent successive Slack messages, as if she couldn’t help but press enter the moment a thought occurred to her, until the entire chat was just lines and lines of @GideonNav (she/her).
Harrow turned to look at her for a moment, and Gideon just smiled, fond and wide. She cleared her throat and spoke out a litany of flattery and Sales buzzwords, reinforcing the product messaging she’d regurgitated from Corona.
Then it was Harrow’s turn. She looked at her slides, at her speaking notes, and they all swirled together in a mass of bullshit. Her heart raced for a moment, and then she felt the press of Gideon’s leg next to hers. She took a deep breath, and looked up at John, Mercymorn, and Cytherea.
“I’m an accessibility expert,” she began, “and I think Gideon’s spent enough time buttering you up, so I’ll dive straight into it. I did a lot of research. I stared at the screen until my eyes bugged out. We made a good feature, and I think you’ll like it.”
She looked at John. “What do you know about web content accessibility guidelines?”
He shrugged briefly. “I just think dark mode looks cooler,” he replied. “And Mercy was trying to tell me that your product had some advantages over Excel, and I thought this would be a nice one.”
Harrow couldn’t help her slow blink in response. She shook off her disbelief, and tried to move past her internal screaming of we did all this because you thought it looked cool?? And her own realization that truly, she was perhaps a fool to expect more from one of Gideon’s customers.
“It is cool,” she said in response, and sighed, shooting a glance at Nav. “Gideon can share the Powerpoint via email if you care enough. Let’s move on to the demo.”
She pulled up the demo environment, and tried to bury her own cynicism as she clicked through various interfaces to showcase that yes, all of it was light by default. “If you click the cog for admin settings,” she continued, clicking the cog, “there’s a new tab here called Appearance. And then if you scroll down, there’s a little toggle, which you can click to enable dark mode. First, however, you’ll need to click save.”
She clicked Save Settings, and then turned her gaze towards her shared screen as a confirmation popped up.
Do you want to accept the darkness?
Yes No
John fucking clapped in delight. Cytherea looked pleasantly surprised. Mercy’s expression was continually sour. Glancing to her side, she saw Gideon’s mouth had opened slightly. Harrow caught her gaze, and smiled. Then she clicked Yes .
The colours shifted. She looked back at the customers.
“So it’s the same interface,” said Mercy, “except darker.”
“It’s actually a lot of in-depth accessibility work,” Gideon started to interject, and Harrow heaved a sigh and said, “Yes, it is – do you want to see anything else?”
“Can you click around a bit?” asked John. Harrow clicked around a bit.
“Marvelous,” said John. “It’s still dark.”
“There’s one more thing,” said Harrow. She opened the settings again, and bit her lip. “I’m sure Gideon’s demoed you our razzle dazzle feature, correct?”
Cytherea looked delighted. “Oh, the one that sends dancing six-legged puppies across the screen when you complete a task?”
“I can’t take credit for that,” Harrow said quietly. “But we did add in an extra theme to accompany dark mode.” She clicked a checkbox that said “Enable dark razzle dazzle,” and then quickly created a task that said Finish this demo. With an overdrawn flourish, she clicked the checkbox to complete the task, held her breath, and a series of skeletons paraded across the screen.
Gideon looked mildly stunned. “You didn’t mention anything about that.”
“I swore the devs to secrecy,” Harrow explained. “Pash will find out… eventually.”
“You’re diabolical,” Gideon noted, like it was a compliment.
“This is spectacular,” exclaimed John. “Excel doesn’t have skeletons.”
“Oh my god,” said Mercy. “I’m just – I’m fucking over this!! I’m sick of your post-its, Gaius!! I’m sick of you flat-out refusing to share anything on our intranet because you’re scared it’ll accidentally share your sexts with Sarpedon – yes, I know about that!! We have a company to run!!” She turned back to Gideon. “Congratulations, you – you red-headed waste of my time!!” And then she turned back to John. “We flew all the way out here to watch some – some intern click a switch! I hope you’re goddamn happy.”
“Harrowhark Nonagesimus is our lead product designer,” Gideon corrected sharply. “She’s been working in SaaS for how many–”
“Nine years,” replied Harrow. She looked around the room. Mercy was still huffing. John had reached into his briefcase and pulled out a bag of peanuts and started eating them. Cytherea was brazenly staring at Gideon with her chin balanced on her hand, an oddly predatory expression on her delicate face. Harrow heard a forced exhale of breath, and for once, it wasn’t her own. She looked at Gideon, watching her chest move in and out. She tried not to watch too intently.
“I like it,” said John finally. “What’s the next step – we ask for the pig?”
Harrow stared at him, wondering what planet she’d been dumped on.
“Um,” said Gideon. “We don’t have a pigs feature on our roadmap. But you could submit a feature request to add it to razzle dazzle?”
John frowned. “I thought that was like our invoice,” he said. “We need to give you some money, right?”
“The SOW,” Harrow stated, still in disbelief that everything she’d been working on for the past few months had led up to this most absurd moment. “Gideon, he wants the Statement of Work.”
“Ohhhhh,” said Gideon. “Yeah, yeah, we can do that – shit, that means I’ve gotta talk to Ianthe again. Which I can totally do, because that’s part of my job. Yeah. I’ll get you the SOW.”
Harrow looked at her watch. They’d been in the room for a total of fifteen minutes. Across the table, John was still eating his peanuts. Mercy was staring at him like she wanted to pull his spine out through his chest. “You can forward it to me,” she said, her voice still tense and high-pitched. “He’s – he’s completely useless!! Pigs, John??”
With a huff, she stood and stormed out. John pocketed his peanuts and followed her. It left Gideon, Harrow, and Cytherea sitting at the table. “Gideon,” said Cytherea, twirling one brunette curl around her finger, leaning forward on the table. “Do you think we could talk about… next steps?”
Gideon looked mildly hypnotized. “Yeah, I’d go down for that. I mean, I’d be down for that.”
“Fabulous,” said Cytherea, her voice almost a purr. “It is a little stuffy in here” – bullshit, tech companies kept their offices characteristically frigid – “perhaps we could have this conversation over a drink?”
Harrow didn’t wait for Gideon to respond, because this was the garbage cherry on top of a garbage cake of a garbage day. She hated Sales, she hated customers, she resented just how much of a stereotype she was being, the inevitable we don’t build for product, we build for customers that would show up on her next performance review. She needed to get the fuck out of there. She unplugged her laptop abruptly, closed it, and clutched it to her chest. “Thank you,” she said once she’d reached the door. “I’m glad you liked the feature.”
Cytherea gave her a moderately amused nod that Harrow interpreted as Cytherea’s own desire for Harrow to get the fuck out of there as well.
She made her way back to her desk, laptop clutched to her chest. Palamedes spun in his seat. “How’d it go?”
“It went,” said Harrow. “They’ve asked for a SOW, which Gideon and Ianthe can handle.” She paused, and looked at him intently. “Please don’t make me talk to customers again. It completely stripped any faith I have in the human race.”
“I’ll try my best,” he said. “Probably not the best time to mention that Pash found some bugs that might impact deploy…”
“Oh god,” groaned Harrow, but she was secretly grateful for any distraction that’d keep her eyes away from anywhere Nav would show up.
Right. Nav was taking Cytherea for a drink so that she could discuss action items.
“I’m not feeling well,” she told Palamedes suddenly. “It’s just — been a lot. I’m going to finish the day from home.”
“You’ve earned it,” he said with a shrug. She felt her breath hitch as she packed up her bag — all she wanted was to get home, melt into her carpet, and forget about this ridiculous goddamn day. She wanted to forget about the feel of Gideon’s leg pressed against hers, the hand against her back, her fucking meaningless charm that had infected Harrow for weeks.
She took the elevator down, and the doors opened to Gideon Nav, still in that arrogantly well-fitting suit, hands in her pockets.
“Oh,” said Harrow. “I thought you were working on next steps with Cytherea.”
“I was,” said Gideon. “They’re sorted. I was just coming up to talk to you.”
“Gideon, I…” She wanted to get out of there. She wanted to never work with Gideon again. She told herself that was true.
Gideon had other plans. She pushed into the elevator, hit the button for floor 9, and waited for the doors to close.
“You’re so fucking cagey,” she said. “But we’re going to talk.” Gideon took a deep breath. “You’re over my bullshit? I’m over your bullshit, Ms. Mute-every-channel.
“I liked making you coffee,” said Gideon, “because I liked that you looked at me like I had something you needed. And I saw you looking at my arms, you know, so I know you were into more than just the coffee.”
“Fine,” Harrow bit out. “Fine, I’m attracted to you. It doesn’t change the fact that you’re a goddamn chaos monster who’s just determined to throw my life for a loop, so congrats on finding a way to do that in person as well as online. Congrats on leaving me holding the bag for your ridiculousness, for cracking my veneer with your Sales charm when I know it doesn’t even mean anything for you –”
“You don’t get to decide what means anything to me,” snarled Gideon. “Because guess what, Nonagesimus – it’s just you and me in this elevator, and you can’t fucking mute me now.”
Harrow stared at her, at her warm brown skin where it met the line of her collar, at her ridiculous hair flopping in her eyes, at those tea-gold eyes intently staring at her. It was stupid, it was all stupid, and she didn’t want to debate what meant anything to anyone.
She grabbed Gideon by her stupid tie, pulled her in, and kissed her. Gideon kissed her back, hard and deliberate, hand coming to cradle Harrow’s head and threaded it through her hair. She let herself melt into it for a moment, let herself clutch Gideon close to her, to feel the press of their bodies against each other.
The elevator dinged open, and Gideon pulled back before Harrow could push her away, but then she reached down and grabbed Harrow’s hand. “You can come with me somewhere more private than an elevator,” she said breathlessly, “or you can get back to your bullshit.”
Harrow stared for a moment, and nodded. Gideon’s eyes went wide, but then instead of pressing the elevator button for the ground floor, she pulled Harrow out of the elevator and away from the main Thalergen doors. She tapped her fob on a simple grey door and opened it to usher Harrow in.
Beyond the door she could see Pash at a distance, ranting to one of her devs about some topic Harrow had no desire to learn more about.
“What the fuck,” whispered Harrow. “How is the dev area somewhere more private?”
“Just trust me,” said Gideon as she pulled Harrow towards another door, and tapped her fob again.
She was met with dozens of tiny blinking lights in the darkness, and just as her eyes had adjusted, Gideon flipped on the overhead lights. She squinted, and the lights focused into stacks of hardware in metal cages.
“Gideon, how on earth did you get fob access to the server room?”
Gideon shrugged. “I have my ways,” she said. She examined Harrow for a moment. “You should take off your backpack.”
Harrow shrugged off her backpack, and before she could question herself or ask Gideon what the hell they were doing, Gideon had her pressed against the door, mouths crashing together.
Harrow reached her hands to clutch Gideon’s lapels and pull their bodies towards each other, and Gideon fucking groaned, her hands coming to cup Harrow’s head.
Harrow kissed all her frustration, all her annoyance into Gideon’s mouth, keeping one hand on her tie while the other clutched at her shoulder. Gideon moved her leg in between Harrow’s thighs, and Harrow gasped at the pressure against her cunt. Gideon ground against her, hands going to the hem of Harrow’s shirt. They were slightly cold, but she moved one upwards, cupping Harrow’s tit through her bralette.
It was good, it was so fucking good, but it also wouldn’t do. She reached her free hand down, taking advantage of the strong spread of Gideon’s thighs to trail her hand up the inseam to stroke her crotch through her slacks. Harrow clocked Gideon’s sharp intake of breath and continued her light strokes, letting the tease of the fabric brush against Gideon’s underwear. Gideon shuddered into her shoulder, breath coming in fast, and when Harrow pressed against her, her hand tightened on Harrow’s breast, and Harrow let out a gasp of her own.
“Fucking do it,” growled Gideon, and both their hands raced to Gideon’s fly. Gideon had it unzipped before Harrow could even try, but she reached her hand towards Gideon’s waist, feeling the firm elastic of her boxers. She trailed her hand around the edge for a moment, and then Gideon grabbed her wrist and shoved Harrow’s hand right down. The angle was awkward, but she could maneuver her hand to brush against Gideon’s cunt, threading through the soft hairs, and they were soaked. “Do you feel,” said Gideon, “how much I goddamn want you?”
Harrow was silent for a moment – responding felt terrifying, and the blinking lights of the server tower beyond Gideon’s bulk reminded her that she was still at work, about to fuck her coworker in a room full of precarious equipment. She angled in, parting Gideon’s folds to run her fingers between. She nodded, heart in her throat, and that seemed to be enough. “Let me feel it,” she said, and grabbed Gideon’s hand and pushed it out of the way, just a mere suggestion of the direction. One of Gideon’s strong arms shot out to brace her against the wall, the other coming up to tenderly cradle Harrow’s neck.
Harrow stroked her, gathering slick from Gideon’s entrance to bring it up to her clit. She could feel it swell under her touch, and Gideon’s voice gritted out “Oh god.”
“What do you like?” Harrow asked, and she looked Gideon right in her wide-blown eyes.
“Pressure,” said Gideon. “I’ll get off really quick if you let me grind against you.” She took a breath. “Bring your knee forward a bit – oh, fuck.”
Harrow pressed, letting Gideon push her further against the wall, her hand pulling Harrow’s knee between her legs. She moved her fingers in line with the pressure, and Gideon rocked her hips against her, her breath hot against Harrow’s ear. She snuck her other hand under Gideon’s jacket, feeling the strong muscles of her back, and it only made her press harder until Gideon tensed all over. Her legs clamped down on Harrow’s hand and knee, and when Harrow looked up, she had her eyes squeezed shut, lip bitten and breath coming hard with her release. There was one abrupt, bitten-off grunt, and then all the tension relaxed.
Harrow slowly pulled her hand out of Gideon’s trousers, bringing her hand up to her mouth. As Gideon came down from her orgasm, her eyes went wide at the side of Harrow’s tongue swirling around her slick-soaked fingers. She waited intently until Harrow had removed her fingers, and then grabbed Harrow by the hair and kissed her hard on the mouth.
Harrow kissed back, letting her body arch towards Gideon’s. Gideon’s hands gripped her shoulders tight, and then her lips moved from Harrow’s to kiss down her jaw, her neck, the tie at the collar of Harrow’s blouse. She let Gideon’s hands roam and clutch all over her body until they settled on the waistband of Harrow’s trousers where they’d been untucked earlier, thumb stroking against her skin.
Harrow sucked in her breath. She wanted more. “Take my pants off, Nav,” she said.
Gideon did her one better and dropped to her fucking knees. Her hands were deft as they undid Harrow’s zipper, pulling her slacks down her legs. “Lace, Nonagesimus?” Gideon’s thumb trailed over the seam of Harrow’s underwear.
“Shut up,” said Harrow weakly. “Just – just do something.”
“Really,” murmured Gideon, eyebrow raised. Her fingers had drifted to the front of Harrow’s underwear, and Harrow gasped as Gideon’s thumb stroked the soaked fabric. She let Gideon play for a moment, and then Gideon’s hands had gripped Harrow’s underwear and pulled them down with her pants. “Fuck yeah,” said Gideon, and she had the gall to grin. “I cannot freaking wait to eat your pussy.”
She looked at Gideon down on her knees, hands stilled on Harrow’s underwear around her legs. “You’re ridiculous,” she said, but her voice was breathy and quick.
“So you’ve told me,” said Gideon, her hands trailing up Harrow’s legs to grab at her ass. “But you’re still going to come screaming my name.”
“Don’t overpromise, Nav,” chided Harrow, and Gideon’s gaze narrowed.
“Queen of darkness,” said Gideon. “My skeleton empress. Deal-saving duchess. I’m going to rock your goddamn world.”
And then she parted Harrow’s lips and licked cleanly through the seam of her cunt, sucking in all the wetness. Harrow let out a noise that should have been embarrassing.
Gideon was merciless as she ate Harrow out, maneuvering Harrow’s hips to her desired angle. Tilting them forward, her tongue probing Harrow’s entrance while she grabbed her ass. Tilting them back, one strong forearm against Harrow’s stomach as Gideon sucked on her clit. She slowed her movements, and Harrow’s chest heaved from where she was pinned against the wall, Gideon’s other hand started trailing up the inside of Harrow’s thigh, and Harrow choked out “ Please. ”
Gideon tore her mouth away and looked up at Harrow, a smirk on her face. “I didn’t realize you could be polite.” Harrow glared at her.
“Shut up and fuck me,” she snapped, and Gideon dove back in, this time adding two fingers. Harrow could have wept at it – Gideon pressed rather than thrust, stroking her fingers against Harrow’s inner walls. It was so good, almost terrifyingly so, and Harrow bucked her hips away momentarily, but Gideon grabbed her hip with her left, and maneuvered Harrow back onto her mouth, guiding Harrow’s hips with the strong fingers inside of her.
Gideon pulled off again, that bitch. “Are you backing off?” she asked, her fingers still moving, and Harrow could only gasp in response. Gideon remained there, mouth still torturously far from Harrow’s pussy, and she keened her hips forward.
“No,” gasped Harrow.
“Good,” said Gideon, and for a moment, she looked almost sheepish, but then she rubbed her thumb against Harrow’s hip bone. “Because if you want to get fucked – which I know you do – you’re going to stay right where I want you and take everything I give you, okay?” Harrow nodded, her eyes catching Gideon. For a moment, Gideon just kept up her slow fucking, but then her mouth was back on Harrow’s clit, rough and frantic, and Harrow bit her fist to keep from screaming.
Gideon was going all in, seemingly determined to overwhelm Harrow with pleasure. Harrow bucked her hips, but Gideon had her pinned, and then she felt the sensation build throughout her entire body, a gentle thrumming until she was almost light-headed. Her hips were shaking, and she knew Gideon could feel it, but instead of pulling off, Gideon reached up with her free hand and pulled Harrow’s hand from her mouth, pinning it against the wall.
Her chest was heaving, and then she felt herself tighten against Gideon’s mouth, her cunt clamping down on Gideon’s fingers, and then it all burst out of her in a visceral cry.
She felt her knees buckle, and Gideon pulled her fingers out, easing the pressure against her hips, and let Harrow crumple to the ground beside her. Her head fell to Gideon’s shoulder, and she slowly came back to herself, dazed and overwhelmed. She looked at Gideon, and there was almost this tender, fraught expression on Gideon’s face.
Gideon wiped her slick mouth off on the back of her hand, and pulled Harrow close to kiss her again, pushing her legs out to bring Harrow into her lap. Harrow could taste herself on Gideon’s tongue, and fuck, they were sitting here in the server room, both of them with their pants down.
“Holy shit.” Harrow tried to catch her breath. “That’s – you.”
Gideon’s eyes twinkled in delight, and then a pout settled on her face. “You didn’t scream my name when you came.”
“I tend to find words difficult then." Harrow settled her hips down from where she was hovering. “I can’t believe I let you fuck me in the server room,” she said.
Gideon raised an eyebrow. “I mean, I was serving cunt,” she grinned, and Harrow gaped at her.
“You’re completely ridiculous,” she said. “You’re a ridiculous person who brings in ridiculous customers and makes my very serious job seem ridiculous.”
“Harrow,” said Gideon, “you made dancing skeletons.” She leaned forward and whispered in Harrow’s ear, “I think you’re a little bit ridiculous as well.”
Harrow stared at her for a moment, and then the absurdity of the whole situation hit her, and she couldn’t help but lean forward against Gideon’s shoulder, shaking in silent laughter.
She pulled back, and Gideon looked up at her, her expression frighteningly earnest as her hands rubbed circles on Harrow’s bare hips.
“I know I’m a sales douche,” continued Gideon. “And I know I ask stupid questions that you’re probably tired of, and I’m also an asshole who decided to put an offhand comment into an RFP rather than talk to the non-hot twin, and that kinda ruined your quarter. And I know the rumours about why I always have my camera off and yes, they’re true. I’m shirtless during half of my meetings. And I probably should have introduced myself that first day, but I’m going to make up for it by stating incredibly clearly that my name is Gideon Nav, I work in Sales, and I would really like to bang you, Harrowhark Nonagesimus, somewhere other than our mutual workplace.”
Harrow took her in, letting her gaze brazenly skate across Gideon’s form the way Gideon had looked at her, the way Cytherea had looked at her. Gideon almost preened at her gaze, and Harrow leaned forward and said, “Only if you take your shirt off.”
Gideon pulled her close and kissed her.
***
@Pash in #darkest-dark-by-anish-kapoor: FUCKING HELL NONAGESIMUS WHAT DID YOU BUILD
@Pash in #darkest-dark-by-anish-kapoor: WHY ARE YOU WASTING ALL MY DEV TIME ON SKELETONS.
@Pash in #darkest-dark-by-anish-kapoor: WE DON’T HAVE ANY GODDAMN TIME FOR THIS BULLSHIT WIZARDRY
***
@DulcieSept in #announcements: Hey Thalergeniuses! Reminder that the server room is off limits to all employees not in DevOps or IT. Thalergen provides many spaces for interdepartmental socializing, and the server room is not one of those spaces. We have changed the fob access code, and all IT and DevOps team members will need to have theirs reactivated.
@Coronabeth in #announcements: While the marketing closet is not subject to the same security restrictions as the server room, it is against safety regulations to lock the door. Furthermore, if you happen to knock some swag off the shelf, please be an adult and pick it back up - we need those keychains for conferences! Lastly, if you happen to use one of our company t-shirts to, um, clean up any messes… please just take it with you. We don’t need to traumatize any more interns.
@DulcieSept in #talent: Reminder to our beautiful Thalergeniuses that while employee relationships are not against the Thalercode, we do request that you alert the Talent team if you enter into a relationship with a colleague so that we can note it as consensual.
Harrow put her phone down. “Well,” she said. “That doesn’t apply to us if we’re not in a relationship, right?”
Gideon kissed her bare shoulder. “Whatever you say, honey.” Her lips started trailing down Harrow’s spine, and Harrow shivered. “Did you send the message to Pal that you were taking a rest day?”
“Yes.” Harrow rolled over to look up at Gideon, who was hovering over her on all fours. “I’m incredibly stressed. I’ve been having some… tension with a certain account executive, and I need to ensure that they’re keeping their hands out of trouble.”
“Lucky them,” said Gideon, and she pounced.