MOAB

Chapter 39: Galene @ 2.2x nhs

Chapter 39: Galene @ 2.2x nhs

“Hey, I was watching that!” Galene said, raising her eyes off her laptop for the first time in a whole hour.

The TV had just been turned off and it had shaken her out of her coding thoughts. She had been so comfortable there on the couch in the middle of crumbs and blankets.

“It’s crap anyway, I did you a favour.” Greg threw the remote away.

Gal noticed that her slobbishness was finally rubbing off on him, just a tiny bit. She felt so proud. “Okay, smart guy, I won’t watch it. Got anything else for me? Find me something with clever people.”

“Clever people on TV, it’s a joke. They are never shown to do any kind of work. They appear smart because Hollywood confuses recollection of facts with intelligence. Do you know what pharmacists in the UK are trained to do? They have this little book called British National Formulary, BNF for short, which has references and facts about the profession. That little book is their bible, they carry it with them, they have an app on their phone, they know it by heart. They are specifically told not to memorise anything that the BNF contains, but to know how to quickly use it to get to the info they need.”

“Yeah, I agree.”

Greg pointed at her chest. “That’s how smart people work.”

She put her laptop aside. She knew him well enough by now to feel a lesson coming, and she could always get back to work later on.

“Googling stuff instead of screenshotting them. Couldn’t agree more.” She paused for a second. “Oh! I can code a heuristic for that.”

“Stop inventing s**t for a minute.”

“Stopping.” She bit her lip and sat down straight like a good little girl.

“I’m working up to something here.”

She nodded.

He held a printout in his hands. “I’ve been reading Artemis’ ideology, some of her speeches, things like that. It’s not a secret or anything, but we’re not supposed to have them. Hermes doesn’t really like that sort of thing.”

“What’s he worried about, that you’ll suddenly break away and become a female Artemis worshipper?”

Greg grunted, “Nnno. Even if that’s technically possible these days, that’s not the problem here. You don’t know the Olympian CEOs like I do. They like their people going single-file. They like them staying inside the marked area. You and me, we…”

“We’re sexy and awesome?”

“That too, especially in your case, but I was gonna say we are, by definition, thinking outside the box. Actually, you can add seven spacial dimensions to the box and that’s where you’ll find us.” He thought about his words, and lately, that was an uncommon thing between them. “Galene, you need to realise that me and you are a necessary risk for them. We imagine without limits, we think faster and further than they can. But the companies are still for-profit. Even our humanitarian efforts are either tax write-offs or they have monetary value somewhere else.”

She frowned. “Okay. I think I get that.”

“This… thinking, Artemis has, is simply stunning. It’s all about standing up on your own two feet, but also being a part of a team. It’s about breaking the boundaries of s****m and other -isms. It’s about needing no one but relying on loved ones. It’s amazing. I want you to read it.”

“Okay,” Gal said, raising her palm.

He gave her the pack of A4 papers, but still held on. “I mean read it. Not skim it, not speedread it, not glance at it on your metro ride somewhere. Fully, actually, take the time to read it and think about it.”

She looked up at his serious face. “I promise, Greg.”

She took the printout in her hands. She read the first line out loud. “It’s better to be strong, than pretty and useless.” Gal raised an eyebrow. “Oh, this is good!”