Selben lives in the beautiful Pacific Northwest with his wife, and two dogs named after EverQuest raid bosses. He is an avid Redditor and gamer (both PC, and pen and paper). A year ago, he discovered r/talesfromtechsupport and felt inspired to share his own stories.
The office was dimly lit with flickering fluorescent lighting on their last legs as Selben entered the office and sat at his desk one morning. Putting on his headset he looked up to see four mysterious robed figures technicians all stand in unison and walk out the door drawing twisted blades reaching for cigarettes as they left. During the ten minutes his machine took to load, Soda arrived, waving as he passed by to his own cubicle.
Recently all the helpdesk technicians, including all the IT managers, had quit, except for one low level tech who had only been there a month. Selben and Soda were brought in on temporary contracts to help until the company got staffing back up to snuff. The other temporary techs were normally internal software devs and were filling in until new people were hired. Unfortunately, this meant they didn’t know much more than Selben and Soda about company procedures for the helpdesk. Documentation at this facility was completely lackluster. Almost everything had been tribal knowledge, being passed from technician to technician, making it difficult to troubleshoot internal systems.
Immediately upon making himself available for phone calls, Selben’s phone rang and he leaped into action!
Selben: Thank you for calling Company, this is Selben. How can I help you?
User: This is User. Badge reader.
Selben: Okay, let me just get a ticket started.
User: Great thanks!
Click
Selben: Hello?
The caller had hung up. Selben began to fill in the ticket, but before he finished another call came in. He scribbled a note to himself to finish after the call. This user had a complex issue that took right up to his 20-minute call goal but managed to finish it at the last moment. He glanced at his note from the previous call, but his phone rang again before he could touch it. This repeated over the next couple hours, including getting several calls from other users who only stated their name, followed by “Badge reader,” before hanging up.
Getting annoyed by the abrupt calls with no information, he put himself on extended call completion so that he would stop getting calls temporarily and walked over to Soda’s desk. As he approached he noted the other techs had gone on their fourth smoke break of the day, so it was just the two of them.
Selben: Hey Soda.
Soda sighed and put himself on extended call completion.
Soda: What’s up bud?
Selben: Have you been getting weird calls about—
Soda completed the statement for him.
Soda: Badge readers?
Selben: Yes!
Soda: Indeed, it’s very odd. I was trying to find documentation for it, but there’s nothing. Let’s check with the other guys when they’re back.
Feeling satisfied there was at least a plan, Selben headed back to his seat. Before he made it, a random user from the office caught him with a snare and dragged him kicking and screaming from his cubicle and asked him to look at something on their computer. It took nearly 30 minutes. The user had managed to unplug his VGA cable, and then attempted to plug it back in upside down. After some pin unbending due to no extra cables in the supply closet, Selben got it working again and was able to escape with his life and returned to his desk to find chaos unfolding.
Two of the four techs were having a yelling match with a company VP, while the other two and Soda were frantically taking calls. The call queue had blown up—none of the badge readers were functioning. Soda finished his call and somehow got everyone to calm down.
Soda: Okay Tech, what did you do in the past when the badge readers stopped working?
He quickly got heated again.
Tech: I don’t know! I was never involved, I just created the tickets that they called.
Soda: Okay, don’t worry, just think. Walk me through a call, would you transfer it or do something else?
Tech: They would call, give their name, and then hang up. I’d then go and look them up to create a ticket and would ask them to call back if they still needed help. They never would. Eventually I would just close the ticket.
Soda: Wait, wait. Where would you look them up?’
Tech: I opened the badge reader app, logged in and searched for the user to make sure they were there. They always were. Then I’d create a ticket and close the app.
Soda: Show me.
After only a minute of Tech showing him what his process was, Soda stood up beaming and called out to the VP.
Soda: Hey VP, if I can fix this issue permanently, will you buy us all gyros from the corner food truck?
VP: Of course! No one else has been able to fix it since we got the readers years ago!
Soda opened the badge administrator application and logged in. Quickly selecting all badge readers company wide, he went to their shared settings, and turned off…the sleep timer. He had realized searching for the user woke the badge reader up, causing it to work after the user called in.
An hour later, all the techs were happily eating their gyros.
Unfortunately, due to the length of time this issue had gone on, most users were still repeating the ritual of calling in, stating their name, “Badge reader,” and hanging up, before even trying to use it. Soda suggested making a prompt on the tech support phone line for badge readers that would go straight to voice mail and be automatically deleted after a set amount of time, and Selben was asked to implement it. Soda and Selben received more gyros for this as well.
More of my stories can be found at https://www.selben.net and https://www.reddit.com/r/selben
Selben muted the customer and yawned. It was the last day before a holiday weekend and had been a long shift. Despite only three calls and two emails for the entire day, none of the techs were allowed to leave early, just in case an important issue arose. Sup1 was pacing around the office in a particularly bad mood since he had been given the responsibility of locking up the building when the techs all left.
Selben: Okay… Now reboot.
User: It won’t reboot!
Selben: Click reboot.
User: Oh, its rebooting now! Is it done?!
Selben: Let’s wait for it to reboot…
Selben finished all his notes for the ticket, then stared down at the time, waiting for it to magically speed up, while occasionally responding to the customer with the occasional ‘Yep, just wait! And what do you see now?’.
User: It’s working now!
Selben: Great, have a wonderful weekend!
User: Okay, bye!
Selben then along with all the other techs returned to staring at the empty call queue
With two hours remaining, Selben watched as a couple other techs finished their shifts, nodding in solidarity as they headed out. Another hour passed with no calls or emails, Selben sat quietly. Sup1 was on his cell chatting with someone, looking a bit more cheerful as the day was finally coming to an end. Once Selben was off his shift, Sup1 could also leave - from what he overheard Selben concluded Sup1 had a date. With ten minutes left, naturally Selben’s phone began to ring, he could practically feel the dagger like eyes from Sup1 across the room.
Selben: Thank you for calling, this is Selben.
A panicked voice came from the other side.
HRDrone: This is HRDrone from HR!
Selben: Okay.
HRDrone: I need to take care of something urgently! But you can’t look at it, because the information is confidential! I need this file completely encrypted!
Selben: Okay, no problem! That should only take a couple minutes.
Sup1 stood next to Selben’s desk, pointing at his watch. Selben muted the call briefly and explained it was someone from HR. Sup1 threw his hands in the air and stomped back to his office.
Selben was eventually able to get HRDrone to give up some of the “classified information.” It was something that had to do with a legal issue, so to be emailed around it needed to be encrypted. Simple enough. Selben offered to connect in and show how to use the software they normally use. However, HRDrone refused to let him connect in case he tried to look at the files.
Sigh.
After two and a half hours, Selben was finally able to walk HRDrone through installing the software and encrypting the file. HRDrone seemed happy about the success and finally the call ended.
No sooner had the receiver hung up, Sup1 was practically pulling Selben out of his chair and pushing him out the door. Besides the minor delay, Selben had a good holiday weekend. The whole company was off, and the IT Department was included - three worry-free days of bliss.
Naturally upon returning to work Tuesday morning, Selben was ambushed then captured greeted and taken to a side office by some HR minions employees. HRDrone, Sup2, and the head of HR were already waiting. Everyone was very upset, so Selben sat and patiently waited to be fired for something he had (or hadn’t) done. After the long weekend it’s sometimes tough bounce back into things without coffee.
HRLead: I need to know why things were handled this way.
Sup2: Please explain to us what the problem is.
HRDrone: HE! (dramatically points at Selben) took forever to encrypt my files and then it didn’t even work. I’m betting is was because he was in a rush to leave on Friday. This is poor customer service!
Sup2: Selben is more than capable of running the encryption software. I doubt he just didn’t do it.
Selben: Ah, well, I was told to not connect to the machine, so I spent two and a half hours walking HRDrone through the process.
Sup2 raised an eyebrow.
HRLead: Why wouldn’t you let him connect? He’s part of IT.
HRDrone: It’s part of The Files.
HRLead: You mean The Files?! Of course they can’t see it!
Selben refrained from letting his eyes roll into the back of his head.
Sup2: Okay, let’s just fix this. Can we look at the file?
After much convincing that seeing a filename wouldn’t let IT know the contents of The File, they got HRDrone to show The File. As Selben expected, it was encrypted, and no issue could be seen by him or Sup2.
Sup2: So, what’s the…
HRDrone interrupted, holding up a hand with a smug look. He opened an email, dated before the call to Selben on Friday, where the file had been shared with him from HRLead, and opened it.
HRDrone: See, it’s not encrypted at all! Also, watch this.
HRDrone pulled out a thumb drive. Selben bit his lip after making the realization of what was about to happen. HRDrone put the drive into his machine and was able to open the file stored on it without decrypting it as well.
Selben glanced over at HRLead, who had gone quiet, seeing his jaw was actually slightly dropped.
Sup2: Okay, I’ve seen enough. HRLead, we will schedule some training for your staff on how encryption works in the next week.
HRLead: Agreed.
As a recap, HRDrone thought once you encrypted a file that all copies of the file in every location would also be encrypted. All HR reps were scheduled to go through a mandatory training over the next month on how to use the encryption software and expectations of how it should function.
With a flick of a tail from the dragon, everyone was dead.
Selben let out a sigh as his lifeless digital body fell to the ground.
Tank: We trying again?
Healer: I’m tired!!!
Selben looked at the time… 4:00am. Whoops!
Selben: Let’s call it for now. See you all later!
An hour later Selben arrived at work for the early shift. He had lost track of time and stayed up all night (again) playing his favorite game, EverQuest. After stopping in the IT kitchen for the glorious nectar of IT coffee, he sat at his desk, rubbed his bleary eyes, and started going through his queue.
Luckily most of the day consisted of small reporting issues that could be fixed without direct human interaction, and only sending the occasional email of “Try it now.” Throughout the day, Sup1 and a Peer kept walking back and forth through the office, with their voices escalating as the day progressed. Deciding to not voluntarily get involved, Selben avoided eye contact.
Towards the end of his shift, Selben felt a presence standing close behind, and realized his uneventful day was about to be interrupted. He slowly rotated his chair to find Sup1 looking angry, and Peer staring at the ground.
Sup1: Tell him!
Peer: Uh, well… A user couldn’t connect to the WIFI.
Selben: Okay, and?
Peer: He was at home and I… Well, I walked him through un-installing the driver, except I forgot to have him download the new one first.
Selben: Can he connect to the wired network?
Sup1: No! He’s on the road. That’s totally unacceptable!
Selben: Well, when he gets somewhere else we can work with him then.
Sup1 grinned evilly happily.
Sup1: YOU will meet him at the airport to work on the laptop!
Sup1 looked very pleased with himself for this plan.
Selben: Who is it?
Sup1: It’s VP!
Armed with minimal information about the actual laptop in question, Selben downloaded drivers for nearly every machine the company used before driving two hours through heavy traffic to get to the airport. Sup1 had arranged for them to meet just outside the security gates at the airport. Selben dozed off and on in his seat while waiting for the (of course) delayed flight. He had been up for at least 27 hours by the time he spotted VP.
Selben: Hi, I’m here from Company to work on your WIFI issue.
VP: Great. This has been such a pain. I think it started after I switched to this new internet web page. You know all about those internet pages, right?
Selben: Uh, sure.
Selben just smiled and patiently waited for VP to pull out his laptop as he rambled about “those internet web pages.” He pulled out his own laptop to check if there was a connection at the airport, just in case he needed one of the few drivers he didn’t download. He slowly turned to see VP staring over his shoulder.
VP: Now what?
Selben’s eye twitched slightly. Lack of sleep was catching up with him, dangerously affecting his patience.
Selben: Your laptop?
VP: What about it?
Selben: Can you get it out?
VP: Out of where? My house?
The trip was a complete waste. VP had left his computer back at his home and somehow assumed IT would be able to fix it. Why he agreed to meet Selben at the airport, no one ever figured out. A few days later, they were able to get VP to use a wired connection and get remotely connected. The issue was fixed within 30 seconds.
Selben entered the office one cold, winter morning, after some much-appreciated surprise time off. He was greeted by the office assistant Ditzy. Her radiant smile and reflection from the light on her shiny new desk was blinding. It was followed with a grunted acknowledgement from Peer, as he worked on her machine with his forehead furrowed. Deciding it was best to let Peer try to sort it out, he continued to his desk which still had a faint odor from before his vacation. Snickers had been given some time off as well from recent events, specifically involving an onion and mustard sandwich.
It was not long before Peer came around the corner with shoulders lowered, Selben let out a sigh.
Selben: What’s up?
Peer: I don’t know. Ditzy’s machine wont power up.
Selben: Power light?
Peer: Nope.
Selben: Power cable?
Peer: Tested.
Selben: Ask hardware?
Peer: He said to ask you.
Selben: Any beeps or anything?
Peer: Nope.
Selben got up and followed Peer to Ditzy’s desk. The machine was completely dead. They got her a loaner machine and ordered a replacement, ticket closed. Selben attempted to return to his normal day, but after a couple hours he got a call from Sup2.
Sup2: Hey, Ditzy’s machine wont power on. Can you check it out?
Selben: I already did this morning with Peer.
Sup2: Well, her loaner is doing the same thing then.
Selben: Huh. Okay, I’ll check it out.
Yet again, the same symptoms—no power, dead machine. Selben replaced the surge protector and had Ditzy walk through how she turned on and used the machine. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary. She would get up and the machine would just die. Selben got her another loaner and chalked it up to the evil I.T. spirits.
A few days later, Selben arrived at work on another cold morning. He was still rubbing his hands together to warm them up, when Ditzy approached him with a frown. Apparently, the loaner computer wasn’t turning on anymore, either. By this point, she had gotten her manager involved and everyone was upset. Selben and Sup2 found her new machine had arrived and was ready to use, so they brought it out and hooked up her machine at her desk. She sat down, sliding forward a little as she leaned over to press the power button, other hand bracing herself on the desk. Selben saw a massive arcing bolt of static leap the last inch between her finger and computer.
Selben: Well, this one’s probably dead now too.
Sup2: What?
Ditzy repeatedly pushed the power button, but nothing happened.
Ditzy: HOW?!
The desk that Ditzy had recently received was one of those bent acrylic transparent desks. As it was cold, she had frequently been wearing wool leggings and wool skirts, which resulted in massive static buildups. She had been frying every machine she touched. She was advised to avoid wearing wool skirts until an antistatic floor mat could be provided, and the acrylic desk was removed.
I was taking a much-needed break after working on a bathroom remodel since early in the morning. Finding my wife left her Xbox on, I stopped to see what game she had been playing. I immediately grabbed the controller when I saw the title screen for Sea of Thieves. I had missed all beta sessions and was anxious to see what all the fuss was about. The character was my wife's and did not properly reflect a character I would play myself, so I opted to change my name in spirit to First Mate Togepi.
Having no idea how to play Togepi opted to do a solo ship, not wanting to disappoint any teammates until he got his bearings. He appeared on the starting island and ran all over trying to figure out what he was supposed to do. Eventually Togepi found his ship and headed out to sea.
First Mate Togepi had no quests or goals other than not hitting any islands or rocks. Togepi was able to get his mighty sloop under control, with only occasionally looking straight up or down due to being unused to a controller rather than a keyboard and mouse. Things were smooth sailing.
Before long, Togepi spotted another ship anchored near a small island. As Togepi aligned his ship and manned the canon, a faint sound could be heard. Unsure if the just the game or a voice from another pirate, he held back from firing to listen. A moment later, he could hear that fabled prepubescent voice screaming.
“JEREMY! THERE’S A SHIP COMING!”
BOOM! Togepi fired his first shot, nailing the enemy vessel.
“JEREMY ITS SHOOTING AT US GO GO GO!!!”
BOOM!!! Another solid hit!
The other ship began to pull away from the island. It was a galleon and had far superior firepower, however Togepi had started the engagement temporarily giving him an advantage.
Several more shots were exchanged. Seeing the galleon look like it was taking on water, and only receiving one shot himself, Togepi was feeling cocky and mocked them.
“This be First Mate Togepi. Prepare t’meet the bottom of the deep blue!”
“Uhm, if you're alone, wouldn't you be captain?”
Togepi paused for a moment, contemplating his self-worth. Finding it easier to not dwell on, he quickly dismissed the thought and fired his canon again.
BOOM! The impact caused an enemy crew member to fly off the deck, splashing into the water.
“JEREMY NO!!!”
The enemy galleon turned, leaving Togepi unable to hit the target. He abandoned the cannon and scrambled to get up to the wheel, but the ocean had turned a blood-like red. The waves became massive and he lost sight of the galleon. Reaching the wheel, he tried to turn back to where he had started, but the sails had almost no wind to them, and the ship began to slowly sink. Feeling he had earned the right, he had a short ceremony pronouncing himself the captain of the vessel. Captain Togepi went down with the ship, down into the dark abyss.
Then I was told I had wasted enough time and went back to tiling the bathroom, while recounting the tales of the mighty Togepi to my wife!
The only thing better than a free lunch is a free lunch with no strings attached. Unfortunately, this was not one of those lunches. Snickers, Selben, Focus, and HR were re-working the employee grading system as some people had been exploiting the current system. Focus kept track of their progress on a white-board, written in a typical bug bashing fashion complete with colorful diagrams and arrows. While effective, it was terribly boring and took long amounts of time. Munching on their free sub sandwiches, Snickers and Selben appeared content.
After a couple weeks of testing, they seemed to have a functioning system and put it in place. Scorecards seemed to better reflect how the techs and other employees performed on a normal basis.
Selben and Snickers returned to their normal duties, and once again had scorecards themselves. Snickers was one of the first to get his new review with Focus. He returned triumphantly and announced to Selben he was a “9.4 out of 10. I’m the best tech!” They both had a chuckle and Selben continued working with a troublesome user who just couldn’t remember the name of his first cat.
“Okay…If you don’t remember your cat, what was your first car?”
“I don’t know!”
“What high school did you graduate from?”
“Meril.”
“That doesn’t work. Did you perhaps write Meril High School? Or MHS?”
“Uh…Just Meril!”
“I said that doesn’t…Okay. Let’s try this one. What is your eye color?
“Are you coming onto me?!”
Selben sighed and pondered for a moment. “Can I confirm your employee number #1234?”
“No, my number is #5712.”
“Okay, no problem. Let’s try this again, my apologies.”
The user had given his name, which was the same as a different employee. With the employee number, Selben was able to ask the correct security questions and reset their password. Finished, Selben was about to ask Snickers if he was ready for lunch, when an immediate meeting summons invite with HR and Focus popped up on Selben’s screen.
“Lunch after my review? Burgers?”
“Burgers… The place on 3rd? Mmm…” Snickers leaned back in his chair, drooling, with his eyes glazed over.
Selben headed over to Focus’s office for his own scorecard review. Focus and a member of HR greeted him as he sat down. Focus looked vaguely confused as she handed Selben his scorecard. A 4.3 out of 10?!
“What the %&#?!”
“Language!” Focus and the HR employee both admonished him.
“Sorry. But… huh?”
Focus started digging through some folders while the HR employee just jabbed a finger at the scorecard.
“This is your scorecard. Please sign below to accept your score. Should you have any questions—"
“Something’s not right. Let me see the data.”
HR let out a shocked gasp at the suggestion and said, “Absolutely not! That information is confidential.”
“He may have a point, HR. None of his old scorecards were below a 9.8,” Focus said.
“Just sign it for now and later we can—"
“No. I refuse to sign until we look at the data.”
Things were tense the rest of the day. HR had all their feathers ruffled. Apparently, they had created a magical deadline for getting the scorecards all updated and were now overdue, with Selben holding up everything.
The next day, Selben arrived to have a bleary eyed and bedraggled looking Focus hand him his updated scorecard with a 9.8, his normal score.
“Better, Selben?”
“There we go!”
“Looks like we’ll need to rebuild the whole project again, I figured out what went wrong.”
After several hours of hassling HR, Focus had finally gotten the data. She stayed up all night and dug through every review. Finding no issues, she ran the report again, but the same 4.3 kept coming up. She ended up waking HR up in the middle of the night to ask how they built the report. Once she learned HR had built the report with employee names rather than employee numbers, she quickly realized what had happened.
Coincidentally, the office also had a janitor named Selben. who always received poor reviews. If anyone had read the reviews, instead of just the averaged score, one particular review of 'Selben yelled at me and threatened me with a mop' would have been a bit of a giveaway.
The scorecard report method they had developed gave HR the choice to use employee numbers *or* names. Focus, Selben, and Snickers ended up rebuilding it again requiring the use of employee numbers only.
Selben was working at this temporary location solo while Soda was off having a baby (well, his wife was, but anyway!). It was a simple phone and local IT support gig while the regular employee was on a long vacation. While the office was large, IT support only consisted of two techs. The rest of the office consisted of software engineers and a couple of VIPs, who were given top priority. Selben had been at the office for a couple weeks and was nearing the end of his contract, when he got the call.
Selben: This is Selben. How can I help you?
VIP: My keyboard software is acting up!
Selben: I see. I’m not super familiar with that. What is it called?
Selben looked around, but the other tech was on lunch, so it was up to him to help the VIP.
VIP: It’s called ‘DICTATION MODE’.
Selben: Okay. Let me get connected so I can see.
After struggling for 20 minutes, Selben was unable to get connected to the VIP and opted to walk over to his office. He shot an email to the other tech, letting him know where he was. The office was two floors up, so he wasn’t 100% abandoning his post.
VIP showed him the software. When he ran it, a bunch of command prompt windows opened and closed, before displaying a box stating, “Ready, please begin.” VIP started talking, and the dictation filled the screen quickly. Seeing nothing wrong, Selben asked what the issue was. It was displaying almost every word he spoke, even correcting itself for mispronounced words. VIP complained it was slow sometimes, but now it seemed okay.
He closed the window before Selben could get a good look. Another series of command prompt windows opened, running more tasks, and quickly closed.
He ran it several more times, and it appeared to be working flawlessly. Selben scratched his head.
Selben: I’ve never seen software like this. Where did you say you got it, again?
VIP: One of the engineers came up with it. Zetol, I think.
Selben: Okay. I’ll talk with him.
Selben walked over to the engineer and started explaining the issue. He began to laugh loudly and asked Selben to follow him. They returned to VIP’s office, he opened the software once again and turned on VIP’s speakers.
A disembodied voice came out of the speakers.
Voice: Hello Mr.VIP I am ready to dictate for you, please begin.
VIP: The software can talk too?! That’s amazing, but why is it slow?!
Voice: Oh, I am sorry Mr.VIP. All of our agents type over 60WMP, but we are human too.
Zetol let out a sigh.
The ‘software’ that VIP was running was actually an auto-dialed session to connect with a third-party dictation company who would type whatever you said. After the session was closed, they would save the files to an online storage provider. While VIP had been explained all of this when he first got the software, at one point he had turned off his speakers. After he could no longer hear the agent on the other end of the line, he had forgotten he was actually talking to a person.
$Selben and $Soda had gotten a two-month contract working on some IT projects at a company through an old contact of $Soda’s. $Soda was locked away slaving away as a code monkey. $Selben could still chat with him during breaks, but otherwise was mostly on his own. He spent his time working on whatever needed to be done—typically things the other techs did not want to do.
$Selben had accidentally finished all open projects, and the printers were (currently) behaving, so he had recently been shuffled off to work with the hardware technician. He started off his day boxing up newly configured equipment and shipping to different parts of the company. The whole facility was really big on recycling, so some of the boxes had old packaging labels on them from their previous use, like “monitor,” “printer,” or even “coffee,” but $Selben did try to cross out any confusing labels. After finishing the last shipment, $ITLead asked $Selben to remain in hardware for the rest of the day and work on repairs, as the hardware tech wasn't feeling well and had headed home. $Selben enjoyed hardware, so he was happy to do so.
Lunch time rolled around. $Selben was about to meet with $Soda for lunch, when he was stopped by a panicked $Whatif.
> $Whatif: A user just called in. They said their laptop was stolen, again!
> $Selben: Send me the details. I’ll take care of it immediately!
$Soda had rounded the corner in time to overhear the situation and offered to help as well. He was currently a code monkey, but no way would a single ticket get in the way of his lunch!
Returning to $Selben’s desk, they pulled up the user’s information. They had just gotten a new laptop shipped to them, and the tracking information showed as “Delivered.” $Selben started to follow the procedure for a lost delivery, when $Soda stopped him.
> $Soda: Hold up. $Whatif said the laptop was stolen **again**.
$Selben looked up the previous requests from the user. Three laptops had been sent to the user recently, and all three had been “stolen.” The area wasn’t known for a lot of crime, so it was a bit strange.
> $Soda: I see some of these boxes for shipping say chips and other stuff.
> $Selben: Yeah. They like to recycle…I see.
$Selben put on his headset and called the location.
> $User: Hello?
> $Selben: Hi there, this is $Selben from IT. I heard you may have had some laptops go missing?
> $User: Yep.
> $Soda whispers: Ask if they got ANYTHING from IT recently.
> $Selben: Have you gotten anything shipped from IT lately? Anything strange?
> $User: No.
$Soda’s brow furrowed, and he started to ponder.
$Selben got an idea.
> $Selben: Who normally receives packages… Maybe check with them?
> $User: sigh Fine, I’ll ask our office admin.
After a few minutes and some sudden shouting in the background, $User returned.
> $User: Never mind! We found the laptops. Thanks, bye.
The user quickly hung up.
Apparently, the hardware tech had gotten a really good deal on some recycled boxes. They were heavy duty corrugated cardboard able to hold 80lbs. But they were meant for shipping frozen fish and the outside packaging matched. So, when the “Frozen Fish” had shown up at the user’s location (three separate times), rather than opening the boxes, the office admin took the boxes and shoved them into their stand-up freezer. Why she thought IT would send frozen fish is still unknown.
All the laptops still worked, once they warmed up after being removed from the freezer. A new shipping policy was implemented, and the hardware tech started covering up logos and descriptions on recycled boxes from that point forward.
$Selben and $Soda got meatball subs for lunch and had a wonderful time.
The last empty box was disposed of. The cool morning air helped to keep $Selben from sweating much, but he still looked bedraggled from the effort of bringing 40+ computer boxes out to the dumpster. Back inside, he slumped back down in his chair intent on returning to his normal duties. Before he could even open the managing tools, $Soda popped his head around the corner.
$Soda: Can you ping $Location71?
$Selben: Uh, I’ll check.
No response from the location. He shook his head no, but saw $Soda’s headset was lit up. He was on his morning conference call, so $Selben took the initiative. He tried calling the location, only to receive no response, including no voicemail. Checking the location's network history, it looked like they had been regularly going down twice a week for the past several months. He emailed the information over to $Soda.
$Selben had returned to his regular work when he heard the jingle of keys. Looking up, he saw $Soda with his coat and big stupid grin.
$Soda: Time to investigate!
They headed over in the van. The steady rattle of some loose tools in the back was only slightly quieter than $Soda chatting on about the new fondue maker his wife had just gotten, and all the different types of cheese you could melt in it. After a long drive, made worse by morning traffic, they arrived at $Location71. They walked up to the door and headed inside. Everyone was working, and appeared normal. The front desk employee looked puzzled at their existence as they approached.
$Reception: Welcome to $Location71. How can I help you?
$Soda: We’re from the helpdesk. We saw you've had a few network outages recently, including one earlier. We tried to call but got no answer, so we came over to check it out.
$Reception checked the phone on her desk, and opened a webpage on her computer. Everything was working fine. $Soda and $Selben went to check the network equipment anyway. Walking past the kitchen, they were pleased to note there was no longer a password on the wall, but instead a motivational poster of a puppy stretching. They opened the small walk-in cupboard where the network equipment was stored next to the kitchen. Coffee filters, snacks and some foam mats were also stored in the same space, which made it difficult to get inside. Naturally $Selben was sent in. After some dexterous movements, $Selben was able to confirm everything was fine. They headed out, not sure what to make of the downtime.
Things went normally the rest of the week. $Selben checked on the location's network and saw no issues until Friday morning. $Selben was nursing a cup of coffee while reading his emails when on his second screen he saw $Location71 go down again. He stood up to tell $Soda, but he was already at the door.
$Soda: Let's go!
They managed to get to the location in record time (it was Friday after all). Walking up to the door, they saw the lights were off. Trying the door, $Selben found it locked. $Soda pulled out his cell and tried to call $Genius, the location manager, but no answer. Noticing a donut shop across the street, they had a snack while they waited for some form of life to appear at $Location71. $Selben was puzzled by the whole situation, and even $Soda admitted he wasn't sure what was going on since the employees' cars were in the parking lot.
They scouted out the area for an hour before they saw the lights turn on and a receptionist unlock the front glass door. They headed back over to see everyone working, just like it should be...
After interrogating asking $Genius what was going on from 7am - 8am, it was discovered the entire office had been doing Yoga / Meditation as a team building exercise twice a week for several months. However, $Genius was sick of phone calls and other 'auditory interruptions', so he had everyone unplug all phones, power down all electronics, including the router and switches, and turn off the lights. $Soda sighed, and recommended leaving at least one phone on in the event of an emergency, and to not power down the network equipment as it could cause confusion and many other issues for the company.
a d&d group who have only ever played virtually are forced to meet up and join forces when it seems their dm has gone missing. the group is comprised of beautiful popular athlete pretending to be a dork online, a dork pretending to be a beautiful popular athlete online, a stereotypical lives-in-his-mother’s-basement gamer who’s secretly rich, and the dm’s brother who doesn’t know the dm is his sister – they’ve never even exchanged real names online. halfway through their search they realize the dm sent them on a wild goose chase on purpose to give them the thrill of a real-life adventure. three quarters of the way through they realize that through the actions the dm set up for them to take, they’re actually being framed for a crime she committed.
The forest of Evil Haunted Darkness came into focus as the robed, frail-looking elf male sat up. Castfate had been lying by a campfire near two other companions. One was another elf, but unlike Castfate, wore dark leather clothing and wielded daggers. Kevy Thievy was the party’s rogue. Next to him was a half-giant paladin called Astro`Gar, serving as the party’s meat shield. His armor glistened in the light of the steadily burning fire, providing a truly impressive sight.
Astro stood and stretched. He tapped his wrist, causing a brief shimmer to surround him. His weapon and shield appeared on his back. Kevy followed with the same strange movement, causing his daggers to appear in his hands. He placed them at his sides with hardly any noticeable movement. Not wanting to be left out, Castfate made a similar motion. Instead of a weapon appearing in his hand, a small portal opened nearby. A small goblin dragged a glittering staff out of the portal and offered it to Castfate. After he took the staff, the goblin averted its eyes and slowly backed into the portal while singing praise to “Castfate the Mighty.” With a pop, the portal and goblin disappeared. Astro and Kevy scoffed and rolled their eyes.
“You spend too much in the cash shop, Cashface!” Astro mocked, using the derogatory nickname he and Kevy had come up with early in the game.
“Yeah, it like totally kills my immersion!” Kevy claimed, while reading a virtual layout of his stats.
“It gives no bonuses! I’m supporting the development process!”
Astro and Kevy looked blankly at Castfate.
“Yeah, yeah, whatever. Let’s get started,” Cashface Castfate said.
The others agreed, and they headed east towards the last known location of DarkRuler, the evil necromancer they had been chasing for the past several months. He had thus far always been able to escape at the last moment.
They reached a clearing in the forest, finding the current tower hideout of DarkRuler. Two undead guards were at the entrance, but something was off. There was no evil cackling, and no booming voice from DarkRuler, taunting them. Every other encounter had this. The group attacked anyway. Astro said something heroic and slashed down the undead. Kevy disappeared. Castfate cast a level 32 fireball and melted the second undead. The fight was routine, with no surprises.
“What the hell, no loot?!” Kevy reappeared at the first corpse, to check the loot.
Castfate and Astro shrugged.
“Pick the lock on the entrance. I’ve got 30 minutes before practice,” Astro said. Actually, a pizza was on the way, but no one else needed to know that.
Kevy easily popped the lock and the door swung open wide. The group charged in only to find a gray room. Nothing else had been created for the adventure, so they were surrounded by the default gray space.
“Uh… am I broken? Now what?” Astro asked.
Castfate looked around. Behind them he could see the open door they had just come through, which led back to the populated forest, even down to the small detail of birds fluttering around.
“Hey, Lordy, are you there?” Kevy called out.
Castfate elbowed Kevy to shut up. The DM hated being called that.
“Is the Lord present?” Astro yelled out in question, instead.
No response. There was no booming voice from the heavens that they would normally hear.
“Why did the game loaded if the DM didn’t finish?” Kevy asked.
The others both shrugged.
They waited another 20 minutes before Astro had to go to “practice.” The other two waited another hour before deciding to log, hoping the Lord DM would be back the next week.
“See you next Friday I guess?”
“Yeah. Seeya then, Kevy!”
Kevy touched his wrist and disappeared into a shimmering light. Castfate did the same.
Castfate, or Adam, as he was known in the real world, stood up from his chair as he removed his VR gear. He had a large bedroom in his parent’s penthouse, with a large window overlooking the city. He headed down the long hallway to grab something to eat, passing by his sister’s room. The steady beat of techno music could be heard as he passed by her closed door covered with hearts cut out from notebook paper. All else was quiet.
He grabbed some chips and returned to his room. He posted on the chat system where their DM, the Lord, would normally hangout and update the group outside of the game, hoping for a response.
The whole week passed, with no response from their DM Lord. By the end of the week, Astro and Kevy were also asking “Where are you?” in the chat program. None of them had any means of contacting the DM outside of that method.
The next Friday, Adam sat at dinner with his parents. He was anxiously checking his phone, hoping for an update before their scheduled game, while his mom was worried about his sister not wanting dinner. Adam ignored her mostly, responding just enough she was satisfied he was listening. He was too focused on his game to pay any thought to his sister. He wolfed down his dinner, excused himself and hurried to his room. Adam threw on his VR gear.
Castfate appeared at a campfire just outside the tower where they left off the week before. The others were still laying on the ground, so he stood guard over them waiting for them to log on.
“The Lord, are you there?” he optimistically called out.
No answer.
A few minutes later, the others stirred.
“Do you think the Lord is back? Should we check the tower?” Astro asked.
Not much for talk, Kevy was already inside the tower and peering through the door they had found last time. It was still full of grey emptiness.
“Looks like a bust, Cashface, Astro!”
Castfate started to glare at Kevy, but noticed something on an upper window ledge of the tower. He cast levitate with a cash shop item and floated up to find a rolled-up parchment. He grabbed it and returned to the others who huddled around as he unraveled it. They found a series of symbols written in a demonic language. Kevy grabbed the letter, as he had an ability that let him read most languages in the game.
Kevy activated his skill. “It says… 867…53…uh, 09? What the heck does that mean?”
“It’s a phone number, bright guy,” Astro said.
Castfate tapped his wrist and used the interface dialer to punch in the number. He put it on speaker as it rang. They reached a recorded message, and the familiar modified voice of the Lord DM filled their ears:
“Prepare for adventure beyond the bounds of woven code. Come find knowledge on Third Street and George Road. Inside on the row of ancient faiths, lies a tome made of gold, with the next answer you seek to hold!”
The message beeped as Castfate tapped his wrist again to end the call.
“Third and George…”
“Isn’t that…”
“The library?!” they said together. A bit shocked, they looked at each other, suddenly realizing they might all live in the same city.
“I’m like a 5-minute bike ride from there, I think that’s Edison Library!” Astro said.
“I could take the train and be there in 15 minutes,” Kevy offered.
The two looked over at Castfate.
“Well… I guess I can go too. I’m on East Street. Yeah, I can get there soon.”
They all agreed to meet at the Edison Library.
Castfate arrived and parked out front. Climbing out of the car, he put on his Canali wool overcoat. He walked up to the front steps of the library, spotting a well-used bike chained to a nearby light pole. He hoped that meant Astro was here already.
Walking inside, he realized they had not exchanged numbers and did not know what each other looked like in real life, other than small things mentioned in passing. He pulled out his phone and tapped in a message on the chat system they used. Nearby he heard a chime. A short, greasy haired guy wearing a leather jacket dug through his pockets and looked at his phone. Castfate walked up behind him.
“Hey Kevy!” he said.
The greasy haired guy looked up from his phone and glared at Castfate.
“Actually, I’m Astro. You must be Cashface.”
“Oh… uh, sorry. I, uh… Online you said…”
A tall, lanky guy wearing a basketball jersey spun upon hearing the names ran over.
“Castfate, Astro! What’s up guys?”
Both were taken back – Kevy’s description of himself did not match his in-game description.
After being shushed by a nearby librarian, they all headed down a side row and whispered.
“We should introduce ourselves. My real name is Adam.”
“I’m Kevin!” Kevy said.
“I never would have guessed. My name is Adam as well,” Astro glared at Castfate just like he frequently did in game.
Kevy appeared to be thinking hard for a moment, then shared his brilliant idea.
“Let’s just stick to our game names then.”
“Yeah, I’ll just stick with Astro. You still suit your name, Cashface!”
Castfate looked over himself. Admittedly, his everyday wear was a bit out of the norm.
“Whatever. Let’s find this golden book.”
It was nearly closing time. The group literally had to run from the librarians to avoid getting kicked out. Eventually they found the “Faith/Religion” section. Many of the books had gold inlaid spines. They figured it would be a note inside one, so not knowing which one, they started checking each one. Astro finally found a note after going through nearly 30 books just as they were captured found by the library staff. He shoved the note in his pocket right as they were escorted out of the building.
“Oh well, we tried. I can come back tomorrow morning and let you know if I find it,” Kevy offered.
Astro held up the paper triumphantly.
“Nice! What does it say?”
Astro opened the parchment and frowned.
“I think it’s written in Russian or something.”
Astro and Kevy considered their options as Castfate pulled out his phone. He opened the app he used for translating words on photos and scanned the paper.
It was another puzzle. It led to an entire series of other puzzles that took them back and forth across the city. They even climbed down a manhole into the sewer to find the one clue.
Around midnight, they arrived in front of a large corporate building. Kevy tried the door, but it was locked and had a keypad.
“What did this one say again, Kevy? Are we sure it’s this building?” Astro asked.
“This letter reads: At 15th and 40th Street, you will find the prize on the 24th floor. Hidden among you is the key to make the door open wide and let you inside.”
Astro and Kevy patted themselves down, digging through their pockets only finding some loose change and notes from the previous puzzles. Looking up at the building again, Castfate slowly pulled out his wallet and touched it against the keypad scanner. The door beeped and opened.
They were fully enamored with the quests and puzzles and didn’t even stop to think about how strange this situation was.
“Sick! Let’s go!” Kevy said.
“How’d you do that? Another cash shop item, Cashface?” Astro grinned and followed Kevy to the elevator.
Kevy ran inside, hitting the button to go to the 24th floor. Castfate slowly followed, trying to figure out why they were here.
The elevator doors opened. Kevy ran into the dark office space. Large glass doors blocked his way. He was about to pull on them when Castfate shouted.
“Stop! It has an alarm.”
Castfate turned and tapped on a keypad near the door and disabled the alarm. The lights in the office turned on. Taped to the keypad, Castfate found another note. In a bit of shock, he handed the paper over to Astro who took it quickly.
“Nice find, Cashface!”
“This is one of my father’s offices. I’m a little weirded out by all this. How did the Lord know I had the key? How did the Lord get here?”
Astro and Kevy had already read the note and gone through the glass doors, running down the hallway towards the final goal. Following, Castfate made the realization which office they were about to open. He yelled for them to stop, but they flung open the door. An alarm blared. Looking around the room, they could see papers had been thrown around, and furniture damaged. The safe was wide open, and completely empty except for a small post-it note. Astro and Kevy ran out of the room and headed back towards the elevator.
Castfate picked up the note before following them. It was a little heart with the message “With love, the Lord.” He felt like the handwriting was familiar, but just couldn’t place it.
They went on the longest most awkward elevator ride down and ran out the front doors to Castfate’s car, which roared to life. They sped off into the night.
Eventually they slowed down and started arguing about what to do. Before coming to a decision, blue and red lights flashed to the rear of the car.
“OMG! Pull over!” Kevy yelled.
“No, get us out of here! Do you know how shady this looks?”
Castfate pulled over the car. The officer gave him a ticket for a burnt-out tail light and let them go.
“That was close, but we still need to figure this out.” Castfate said.
Before he could offer any ideas, all their phones chimed in unison with a message on their gaming chat system. It was followed by the screech of tires as the officer made a U-turn and headed back to them.
Kevy read the message out loud. “The Lord: Good luck with the police, idiots!”
This story takes place in a game called Vanguard: Saga of Heroes (RIP ☹ ). The characters involved include myself and my then girlfriend (now wife!), Zirq. For those who never played Vanguard, it was heralded (like all new MMORPGs) “Groundbreaking” and “Most Advanced!” etc. As such, it had countless bugs and other issues. I seemed to have a knack for finding said bugs, which often got me into some interesting situations.
Selben and Zirq had been grinding (killing monsters with minor questing) late into the morning night and woke up in a haze the next day, ready for more adventure. Selben signed on to work on one of his plethora of tradeskills so he could earn some in game money for gear. To his surprise, Zirq was already online.
Selben: Hey! What are you doing on already?
Zirq: I got my boat!
Selben: Huzzah! Can I captain a little?
Zirq: Sure, but we’ll need to get to the ocean first. This lake I’m on is way too small.
Selben: Okay, let’s go!
They started traveling. Being pretty far inland, it was going to take a while. Selben checked his map and saw a nearby river leading straight to the ocean. He came up with a brilliant plan.
Selben: Let’s drop the boat in the river and take it down!
Zirq: Alright!
The boat worked mostly flawlessly. They quickly safely passed high level mobs and other players along the shores, some waving as they went by.
Selben: We’re almost there, can I take over?!
Zirq: Yeah, here you go.
Zirq backed off the helm of the small craft. Selben took over and continued a bit longer down the river. Just ahead, things started to look a little strange, like the water ended… Much too late, he realized it was a massive waterfall!
Zirq: Uh oh…
They plummeted down the waterfall The boat remained upright as it fell. The physics of the game didn’t seem to know how to handle this scenario. Just as the boat should have crashed into the water below the waterfall. it continued falling and warped onto the bottom of the ocean, far from where they had been, and then de-summoned itself. Selben and Zirq were left standing at the bottom of the ocean not needing to breath and but also unable to swim.
I was a young DM, just doing my best. I was confident I knew the rules well, but previously I had only lightly dabbled in item creation, while mostly following pre-made books and adventures. However, this was a holiday session, so I wanted to step out of my comfort zone to create a fun and interesting session. Candyland was created!
The regular group had been left in the bottom of a dungeon during their last session. They spotted a massive rat wearing a strange outfit, chased it. Then ran into another character, Dana. Dana did not normally play D&D, but wanted to join our Friday night escapades.
Elvu, Zirq and Wuufy quickly grouped up with Dana and followed the rat into a dark cavern. They emerged in a Willy Wonka-esque Candyland.
Zirq: I make sure I still have all my equipment.
Wuufy: I prepare my spells.
Elvu: I climb a nearby tree to spot the rat or anything else.
DM: You easily climb up the somewhat sticky branches. The smell of chocolate and mint fill your nostrils as you realize it's made of candy!
Elvu: I break off a branch and take a bite as I continue to climb.
DM: It's delicious chocolate. You make it to the upper branches. As far as you can see, there are candy forests. You catch a glimpse of the rat heading towards a massive castle in the distance!
Elvu: I climb down and let everyone know what I saw.
Zirq: I prepare my...
Dana: Are there any animals?
DM: Uh... Yes!
Dana: Can I use befriend animal? I'm supposed to have one it says.
DM: You spot a gingerbread bear - it comes up to you and licks your hand, clearly it is willing to be your...
Dana: (Almost frantically) Are there any gummy bear hamsters?!
Dice hits the table... Nat 20
Group giggles
DM: You sit down on a nearby fallen candy cane log and just happen to find a pink gummy bear hamster.
Dana: His name is Edwin!
Elvu: Okay... So now we all gear up and...
Dana: What does Edwin do?
DM: Oh, uh... He's more of a familiar, he can’t really attack...
Dana: Does he poop?!
Wuufy: He probably poops jellybeans!
Party giggles.
DM: Hm... Yes! Yes, he does. He poops jellybeans.
More laughter.
Dana takes notes.
Dana: Can I eat the jellybeans?
More laughter.
DM: Yes, you can! And if you roll a D6 it will give a random stat boost +1 for one round. He creates three a day, and it’s a free action since they are so small. (Yes, I gave her a sheet for enchanted hamster jellybean poop.)
Dana: What's a free action?
DM: You can use it as much as you like.
Dana: I eat one! I gain +1 charisma!
Party takes a few minutes to calm back down, giggling continues through the game, a bowl of jellybeans sitting on the table does not help.
The party regroups and carries on through the candy cane forests, battling nutcracker trolls and assorted rat-men, while unveiling a darker side to the candy kingdom. After several weeks of adventuring, they eventually reach the castle itself. Dana has learned how to use her spells more and more efficiently, and the party is ripping through the castle… until they meet the big bad. A giant rat turns out to be an evil sorcerer (I know, cliché...). The final battle is going on, when Elvu and Wuufy both take an over-calculated hit of pink candy fog and go down.
Zirq: I think we need to run, come on Dana!
Dana: Here, take this.
Dana hands Zirq her backpack with a note, and turns to the big bad.
Dana: You big meany, you hurt my friends - now you will pay!
She uses her charisma to distract the big bad with a nat 20.
Big Bad: HAHA You are pathetic! (Queue bad-guy speech)
Zirq starts rolling dice, and then attacks... backstabbing the creature with a questioningly high roll.
DM: What was that?!
Zirq: She gave me a note to eat all the jellybeans. My str and dex are both over 50.
And that is how they defeated the Big Bad of Candy Land... A game breaking item I created...
A side note, everyone had a great time - and even today when I hand out a magic item the phrase “So is this one of those jellybean items or...”
I just wanted to take a moment and say a huge thank you to everyone for your support of the book release of IT Newbie. Honestly, when Zirq told me she was putting it together, we both expected to sell maybe 5-10 copies (half to family and friends!).
As of my writing this, over 100 copies have been sold or read on Kindle Unlimited. I sit here knowing my writing is on shelves and ebook readers all around the world, even if it's just a handful here and there. That's an amazing feeling. There's even been three reviews that I know about: One on the UK Amazon site, one on the German Amazon site, and one on Goodreads.
It blows my mind that so many people have been interested in my book, as I can barely believe the numbers I'm seeing. Talk about good motivation to work on another one! So, thank you everyone!
Do you like to read in Chronological order? Here is the Index
Our Cast
$Selben: Previously Tier 1 tech support, now an IT contractor - a bit more into his career.
$Hardware: The hardware guy in the IT department.
$Soda: Entrepreneur and IT Consultant, and in a way $Selben’s boss. Extremely knowledgeable IT guru. Previously worked with $Selben at $SmallerCompany until they decided to move on. Also had a never-ending supply of 48oz sodas constantly on his desk, in his car, literally everywhere!
$Whatif: Administrative assistant, not the brightest - but still a nice person.
~~
$Selben and $Soda had gotten a two-month contract working on some IT projects at a company through an old contact of $Soda’s. $Soda was locked away slaving away as a code monkey. $Selben could still chat with him during breaks, but otherwise was mostly on his own. He spent his time working on whatever needed to be done…typically things the other techs did not want to do.
Today, $Selben was working with $Hardware. He was unpacking new desktops and setting them up in the computer lab to be configured. $Selben was about to take the empty boxes out to the recycle bin when he heard a familiar voice talking to $Hardware.
$Hardware: What can I help you with?
$Whatif: The printer by conference room two is acting up. I sent in an email, but nobody has replied. It’s been two days.
$Selben thought he heard the faint words whispered, “Mal Diablo,” but couldn’t be sure.
$Hardware: Mal di… Er… No problem, $Selben can check it out.
$Selben peered around at the piles of boxes that rose up to his head and wiped the sweat from his brow.
$Selben: No problem. What’s it doing?
$Whatif held out a stack of papers. $Selben took them and saw they appears to be gibberish—words smashed over other words and some were upside down. It was pretty unreadable.
$Selben: Okay, let’s check out your computer.
They walked down the hall, passing signs and inspirational office posters, like “Passion, what drives you?” with some guy staring at a pencil. Reaching the door to conference room two, $Selben found the printer, as well as overflowing recycle bins, and made a note to empty them along with the cardboard later. He restarted the printer, and reinstalled the drivers, and tested the results.
$Whatif picked up the documents and found they still had the same issue. $Selben tried a generic driver, but got the same results. He then opted to try printing from his own machine. Same issue, so he tried using the identical printer by conference room one, and that worked fine.
Clearly the issue was with the Mal Diablo, so $Selben approached his fabled foe. He glared at Mal Diablo, which stared back with a happy green light, claiming all was well. He did a test print from its button panel. Clunk, clunk pvvvtt! The page shot out, again the text was garbled as if written in tongues.
$Selben sighed, and returned to his desk to email the other techs to inquire if they had encountered the issue before. They only offered basic suggestions, which he had already tried. $Hardware and one of the techs poked at the printer as well, but Mal Diablo wouldn’t budge. It kept spewing out more and more gibberish.
$Selben was told to contact the vendor. After being walked through the same troubleshooting steps that multiple people had already tried, they offered to send out an onsite tech within a week. A sign was placed on Mal Diablo the printer saying to not use it, or your documents would be cursed ruined.
Printer traffic was diverted over to the matching printer by conference room one. $Selben returned to his normal duties and hoped the printer tech would be able to figure out the problem.
A few days later, the tech arrived spent several hours of troubleshooting. He concluded a part would need to be ordered. The tech had never seen the issue before, and was skeptical about his own solution, but it was the best anyone had come up with yet. $Selben suggested it was a curse. The tech only nervously laughed, and said he would be back in a few days.
***
Two days later
The printer by conference room one started doing the exact same issue! $Selben spent the better part of the day on the phone with the vendor and dragging any free techs over he could find. Everyone was stumped.
$Selben took a late lunch. A pile of the cursed papers sat next to him, tormenting him. The wretched cursed gears of Mal Diablo, churning and grinding, wouldn’t leave his mind in peace. $Soda plopped down next to him with his own lunch, and started complaining about the $BasicallyCoding program he had been working on and how annoying it was.
$Soda: It’s so similar to $+Coding, but won’t do cross-platform. They should just start over—it’s a mess!
$Selben: Yeah, I’m not doing great either. I’m having issues with Mal di… er, one of the big printers.
$Soda: Did you check the basics? Also, my wife is making pies in her cooking class!
$Selben was intrigued by pies, but fought the urge to respond, knowing $Soda’s game.
$Selben: Yeah, the vendor ordered parts. The second matching printer does the same now too. What kind of pies? (Dang it!)
$Selben held up one of the pages, showing $Soda. He started rambling about caramel apple pie, strawberry rhubarb, pumpkin chiffon… while looking over the cryptic scrambled pages that had been printed out.
The next thing $Selben knew, he and $Soda were standing in front of Mal Diablo, as if somehow teleported.
$Selben: Huh… What?
$Soda: The drawer, open it.
$Selben leaned down and opened the paper drawer. (When was the last time he had added paper to this?) He reached in and pulled out… A page covered in text?
Apparently, in an attempt to recycle, $Whatif had been taking discarded papers from the recycle bins and reloading them into the large printers. Presumably thinking the printer would somehow know to pick the correct side to use…or that it would magically clear the page before printing? $Selben wasn’t sure.
When the whole office had been switched to the second printer, it had quickly run out of paper. So $Whatif reloaded the printer with used paper from the recycle bin. Once the used paper was replaced, the mysterious printing issues were resolved.
$Selben still couldn’t explain $Soda’s powers of distraction or teleportation, but $Soda did bring him some pie the next day!
Do you like to read in Chronological order? Here is the Index: timeline.selben.net
Our Cast
$Selben: Previous Tier 1 tech support now an IT contractor - a bit more into his career.
$Soda: Entrepreneur and IT Consultant, and in a way $Selben's boss - Extremely knowledgeable IT guru. Previously worked with $Selben at $SmallerCompany until they decided to move on. Also had a never-ending supplies of 48oz sodas constantly on his desk, in his car, literally everywhere!
$ITLead: IT lead from current company.
$Tech: Random technician working at the company.
$CEO: CEO of the company. An older gentleman, knows how to run a company.
~~~
This tale takes place while $Selben and $Soda were running rogue, switching from company to company as temps doing contract work. At this location, the company was decently sized, but only had two locations, about a 30 minute drive apart. $Selben was placed on the helpdesk alongside $Soda. The other two techs they were filling in for were getting married (*yes to each-other*) so it was a short two week deal during the honeymoon. Unfortunately, due to their short contract, not much time was spent getting them up to speed on all the processes. Anything outside of general SOP (*Standard Operating Procedure*) was pretty vague.
$Selben and $Soda had been assigned their desks, a double cubicle. Each side was distinctively decorated for the his and her's which the previous lovebirds had been sitting in. $Selben drew the short straw and got the ‘Her's’ side, complete with the excessive pink--pens, paper and other stationary were so pink that they had a slight glow to them. $Soda had a pretty standard desk with only a few pictures of the couple. $Selben poked at a pink stuffed bear that leaned against his monitor as $ITLead walked up.
> $ITLead: I’ll send a link to our rough process flow, but basically, if you think you can fix it, go for it. If it's our proprietary software, just transfer the call to $Tech. Otherwise, if it's $CEO, just do what he wants. You’ll be taking calls, most are pretty basic. Thanks again for taking this on such short notice, $Soda!
> $Soda: No problem, sounds good!
$ITLead made his leave, and $Selben and $Soda started taking calls. Things were pretty simple--How to use this, why won't this save, and why is this slow. After a few calls, $Selben got a more interesting call.
> $Selben: Hello, this is $Selben. How can I help you?
> $CEO: This is $CEO, my mouse isn't working. I need a new one!
> $Selben: Sure! But just before we do that, what kind of mouse is it?
> $CEO: Let me check…
Through the headset, $Selben could hear papers being pushed around, and the unforgiving sound of plastic banging against a desk, before the out of breath voice of $CEO returned.
> $CEO: I don’t know! I’m going to bring it in so you can check!
> $Selben: I was just checking to see if… Hello?
The line had gone dead. $Soda slurped on his drink (which had appeared out of nowhere). His eyebrow was raised, $Selben simply shrugged. $Soda turned his attention back to his call, which naturally seemed to have nothing to do with tech support.
> $Soda: I love Pomeranian puppies! Click next. Oh, you have to keep up on their grooming, though!
$Selben resumed taking calls for the next 30 minutes or so until he heard the now familiar voice of $CEO. $Soda continued with his call as $CEO walked into the cubicle, and plopped his laptop and wireless mouse on the desk.
> $CEO: Mouse won't work!
> $Selben: Let’s take a look!
After several attempts, a bit of nervousness was setting in. $Selben almost started to sweat--this was the CEO of the company! And he was standing over his shoulder, going on about getting a replacement ASAP if this one wasn’t fixable! $Selben was trying to sync the mouse, but it just wasn’t working…
> $CEO: Do you think you can fix it, or should I ask $ITLead?
> $Selben: Well… I, uh…
$Soda spun around, and started chatting with $CEO.
> $Soda: What kind of car do you have?
> $CEO: Oh, I have a $2002Kyoto!
> $Soda: Oh nice! How often do you replace the batteries in those?
$CEO started rambling on about the savings and warranty, but $Selben realized what $Soda was telling him. He dug into the pink filled drawers until he produced a set of AA batteries. After putting them into the mouse, the cursor instantly popped up on the screen.
> $Selben: Good to go!
> $CEO: Perfect. Thanks! I’m asking for you next time!
Over the next week, $CEO brought $Selben his laptop several more times for small issues similar to the first encounter.
Early into their last week, $Selben and $Soda were taking calls from people reporting slow network traffic at the second office. $ITLead stopped by with $Tech and let $Selben and $Soda know they were heading over to the other office to investigate the slowness. The office only being 30 minutes away had some advantages for situations like this. Almost immediately after they were out the door, a feverish number of calls came flooding in reporting the network was now completely down.
> $Soda: I’ll try to reach out to $Tech and $ITLead to give them a heads up. Just stay on the calls and try to calm people down.
> $Selben: Got it!
$Selben answered more calls. It appeared none of the office workers communicated with each other, and ALL decided to call in on their own. $Soda finally got through to $ITLead. $Selben only heard $Soda’s side of the conversation.
> $Soda: Yeah, we're letting people know…
> $Soda: Right… You what?
> $Soda: It's gone?
> $Soda: What should we do then?
$Selben heard the familiar out of breath throat clearing as someone came up behind him. He turned slowly to see $CEO standing there, holding a rackmount router. $Selben pulled on $Soda’s sleeve.
> $Soda: Ah, excellent. We found it. Want us to reboot it here?
$CEO stood looking perplexed.
Apparently when the network slowed down and $CEO wasn’t able to reach the helpdesk due to the congested phone lines, he decided to take action, the only way he knew how! He went into the network room, unplugged the router, and drove it over so that his favorite helpdesk employee, $Selben, could fix it. He was a nice enough guy, but just really didn’t understand how computers, or electronics of any kind, worked.
First shared on Reddit’s Tales from Tech Support, this is the tale of Selben’s first job in IT support, and the superhero mentor he was lucky enough to have. Through calming irate customers, to internet outages, and even handling a haunted office, Selben and Soda tackle it all.
Thirteen short stories have been collected and edited for your enjoyment, including two never before shared anywhere!
And remember, if you need to distract an angry customer while you fix their computer, just talk about food!
