“Oh my lord…” I cringed and put my palm on my face. “Alright, I’ll just…” I slid the neat brown folder across the desk without even looking at him.

“Come on, don’t be so silly, Matt.” The man returned the folder to me to my confusion. “You got a Shielder’s badge! That’s like… An instant qualification ticket! You got the job, ooh-la-lah!”

“Oh… okay?” I looked at my badge then back at him. “In that case, what’s your name uhh… Boss?”. 

“My name… My name is Michael Taylor, my friend! From now on, we’ll be the best of friends! We’ll be BESTIES! We’ll work together to build houses like hell, and we’ll make loads of cash!” He extended his arm to half hug me.

“Michael… You’re scaring me.” [Blink]. “Don’t worry", he said, ”Although there’s something I would like to discuss with you. Something… A bit too important, my friend.”

“Uhh? What is it Michael?” I gently got his hand off me and looked at him. “It’s about Emptiness, Matt. Surely you know something about it, yes?” 

…

“Your silence speaks volumes, Matt. Looks like I hit it right in the bullseye!” He fingerbanged me as I remained in silence. Hell, I already hate this guy.

I shook my head. “I’m not exactly sure how you know that exists, and frankly I don’t want to know either… But the information was gonna be publicized anyway. So let’s see…” I looked through my phone to see if the events regarding Emptiness were already shared.

“Right, it’s already all public. Just take a look at this…” I showed my phone to him, as he leaned and put his palms on his face emoting an exaggerated thoughtful expression. “You have internet access, right? You should already know about this Michael…”

“Well…” Michael stood up and chuckled. “I’m not a fan of staring at phones for too long… So, thanks, Matt!”. “You’re welcome…” On the internet, tons of news articles were already posted, and lots of people were expressing their concerns and complaints on social media. I find it odd that he didn’t seem to care about that. “Well then Matt, surely you want to start working, aye?” He smirked and looked at me. “Uhhh yeah, I was hoping we could make houses that could be protected from Emptiness. One of my co-employees and friend is immune to it, so it’s definitely possible.”

“Your friend? Who would that be? Mmm??”

“Arthur Gold, you know, the guy who used to be a king for generation after generation…”. “Fantastic!!!” Michael started to clap for me. “You sure are a popular man! My, you’ll make both of us so rich!”

“Well… Yeah. I’ll look into it some more, but for now, why don’t we get to work?” I scratched my head a bit.

“Righty-o Mr Matt! I’ll advertise our magnificent plan to mass produce households that will survive the end of the world!” Michael sat down and touched his computer. “This beauty will auto generate an advertisement for us and spread it everywhere, it only costs a small amount of money for someone like us, but I’ll cover it.”

“Right…” With just a few gestures and taps from his hand, the advertisement was auto-generated and completely finished.

“Now then Matt, how about you go and search for… Literally anything on the web?”

“Uh, okay.” I held my phone and searched for ‘Cute Kittens Compilation’

I quickly noticed an ad on the right side of the website. An ad for this business, if this guy can put ads everywhere so quickly, I should probably be careful with him. He seems to have a lot of control on the market, my god...

“Welp, now I see I shouldn’t mess with you. I guess we wait for clients.” I saw Michael quickly check his computer and then he looked at me with glee. “Worry not Matt, we already got ourselves a nice customer interested in our business. Here, look at this!”

Walking to his side, I took a quick glance at the computer’s screen. I noticed there was a list of people interested in purchasing a house… already. Wow.

Michael chuckled. “There’s a lot of land in a more open area a few minutes of driving from here. That’s where you and I are gonna start building houses like crazy, mmhmm!”

“Right…” I held my coat and pulled it a bit nervously. “So, I’m guessing you have a car?”, “Of course I do Mr. Matt! Look!”

At that moment, Michael pressed a button on his desk, and a beeping sound started to loop in the building.

“Uhh… Michael?” I looked around wondering what that startling sound was about. Suddenly, my body got lifted. “W-what?!” I looked below me, and noticed a small space ship had appeared on my feet. “Michael? You… got a spaceship? It doesn’t look big enough for us!”

He smirked, soon enough I slid down the spaceship but I managed to land on my feet. “Ugh… You could’ve warned me, you know.” 

Michael simply opened the ship’s door, and got in. “Well Mattt… I figured you’d learn more if you saw this nice vehicle by yourself, rather than by hearing my boring words.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” I blinked and raised an eyebrow, but nonetheless, I ended my confusion with one big sigh. “Nevermind… You want me to get in there with you, right?”

Michael nodded. “Yep, come in.” I awkwardly sat next to him in the spaceship, and then… the roof of the building opened.

“How much money did you spend on making your company’s building so convenient, Michael?” I just looked at this... bizarre man, honestly not sure what was going on anymore.

“More than you’d think, heh.” The small spaceship then bounced off the ground and took flight outside of the building. I looked through the window and saw the roof close and look normal again.

To be honest, I believe I would’ve felt more comfortable riding Crystal than doing this, now that I think about it. But it’s too late now… Compared to the spaceships at Stellar Site, this one feels more cheap, more basic, I can feel my body shaking as this thing travels at fast speeds. The Stellar Site spaceship didn’t make us feel anything!

Putting my hand on my chest, I felt my heartbeat accelerating at unbelievable speeds. Yet Michael looked so calm while driving this thing. The fast view started to make me feel motion sick… I felt weak. So weak. So… So weak… Soon enough, my eyes shut, and my body stopped moving, I guess I passed out again… Out in complete darkness.