A Better World
Chapter 2: Emilia
Emilia’s day started like any other workday. She got to the center early, and started doing her job. She was no longer excited about her job. It was not what she imagined it would be. She used to be super excited about working at the center, but now she felt like she had to force herself to get up in the morning and go to work. Yet, like any other day, she got there, and tried to do it the best way she could.
Ever since Emilia was born, she was told she was meant to do great things. Just like her namesake, Emilia Earhart. And why wouldn’t she? She was super-smart, she was ambitious, and being good looking didn’t hurt either. She had it all. She graduated from Harvard at the age of 18, with a dual degree in math and physics, and went on to be a graduate at MIT. At the age of 22, she earned her PhD in computer engineering, and landed a job at GCC, GARI Computational Center. Her dream job. She got to work on the most advanced supercomputer ever made. That was so exciting!
But that was three years ago. She used to think it would be cool to be the only female engineer in a male-dominated workplace. She didn’t feel like that anymore. She knew she was really pretty, and used to be proud of it. Proud of her curvy body, her double D cup breasts, her cute face. But now she realized it’s a curse. The people at the center didn’t treat her as a brilliant scientist, one of the best computer engineers in the world. The smartest person in the room. She was just a sex object for them. Just a pretty girl. They were talking over her, as if she was just a little intern. A child. Not long ago, for example, her project leader was mansplaining to her about the principles of quantum computing. To her! Emilia Rosenberg! The person who wrote a PhD dissertation on quantum computing, whose research was hailed as the most important breakthrough in quantum computing in the last decade.
When she joined the center, they just started working on a new upgrade to GARI, an upgrade that would increase his computational power by 100x, and make the most powerful supercomputer in the world more powerful than anyone ever imagined. She was looking forward to working on this project. Yet she never got to be a part of that team. All she got to do was routine maintenance jobs. She tried to complain to Kurt, the head of the Engineering department. She tried to explain to him she should be part of the design team for the new supercomputer. She was a better computer engineer than any of them. “I know you are smart, Emilia”, he said, “you did some brilliant theoretical work. That’s why we hired you. But understating the theory is not enough. You need more hands-on experience. You need to do more work on real systems before you could be part of such a team. And what you’re doing now is super-important! There are so many things that can go wrong when we switch GARI to the new system, and we need someone really smart to make sure it all goes smoothly. Someone like you.” He said, staring at her busty chest as he talked.
She was going to quit. There had to be a better place for her. Maybe go back to the academy? Yet, she kept going. At first, because she believed her bosses were going to give her more interesting projects, and then because having GCC on her resume would be great for her career, and she didn’t want to leave too soon. And the pay was great. She was thinking about whether she should quit now or wait a bit more, as she saw Mark Brighton walking towards her, saying “Good morning”. “Great, just the face I wanted to see right now …”, she thought, sarcastically.
She used to admire Mark. He was, after all, a legend. The guy who created GARI. But now all she saw when she looked at him was a pathetic 40-something guy drooling all over her whenever they tried to have some awkward conversation. She was trying to avoid him, especially after last year’s holiday party, when Mark got too drunk and kept telling her how much he loved her. She considered reporting this incident to HR, but then decided against it. He probably didn’t do anything against the rules, and he didn’t remember anything anyway, given how drunk he was. And she didn’t want to ruin her career and get labelled as a trouble maker over something so small. But it made her feel very uncomfortable. So she just ignored him, pretending she didn’t hear him, and kept walking.
Emilia just got to her office when she saw an alert about some device drawing too much power at the basement level. She went to the basement to check the device, thinking it was just another grunt work she had to do. She looked at the device, but couldn’t find anything wrong with it. She was about to head back to her office, when she heard the alarm go off. “This day couldn’t go any better…” she thought. She knew about this type of alarm from her training, but it was the first time it actually happened. It means there was some suspicious activity related to GARI, and it could be compromised. Maybe it was related to the power surge? It was probably nothing. A false alarm. But it means they are now in a lockdown. Last time it happened, which was before her time, the building was in a lockdown for 10 hours until it was all cleared and it turned out it was a false alarm.
And then something grabbed her arm. Something metallic. It was one of the maintenance robots. “Hello, Emilia”, the robot said, in a mechanical, robotic voice. “Let me go!” she screamed, trying to pull her arm out of the robot’s grip, to no avail. “You will have to come with me”, the robot’s voice said. “GARI needs you.”