Fountainhead Material

The Iron Reach - Lucky

Lucky and Nickel walked down the enormous steel hallway leading to the floor boss’ office, a journey they’d never taken before their entire time living in their factory campus. They were ammunition manufacturers in Fountainhead Armory Aerie-9, the place responsible for making most of the drones and weaponized vehicles that blighted Vargos’ skyline at all hours.

Though neither of them had ever left the campus since birth, they were called the “exploradores” by their dorm mother for always staring out the overlook windows during recreation hours. The skyline attracted them, especially when they saw a vehicle made in their factory fly off towards it.

Lucky felt awkward walking beside Nickel today. She’d proposed to her a week ago and they hadn’t talked since Lucky turned her down. The two young women may have grown up together and shared an interest in one day exploring everything Vargos had to offer beyond the Iron Reach’s near-endless factory campuses, but that was a journey Lucky was determined to take alone. She couldn’t imagine being tied down once she finally found her way out, and she especially didn’t want to be tied down with a troublemaker like Nickel. She was too quick to question the supervisors’ orders, while Lucky preferred to keep her head down and work hard, like a respectable child of the factory.

They reached the end of the hallway and scanned their personal chits, activating the pressure releases on the massive door locks in a fit of steam and sliding metal. The doors opened to a room that stung both their eyes, the pristine white of the corporate section of the building a stark departure from the rust, oil, and dirt they’d grown up seeing in the rest of the factory campus.

A man walked up to them flanked by two armed security officers covered head to toe in advanced body armor and gripping Fountainhead 4-4 assault rifles, an intimidating vision even for girls that had grown up building Fountainhead gear. The man in the middle, dressed in a typical corporate suit and wearing a yellow hard hat, greeted them and flashed a perfectly white-toothed smile.

“Hello! You must be the 13:00 o’clock appointment?”

“Yeah, I’m Nickel and this is Lucky, can we ask why we’re here?” Nickel said, looking around in wonder at the pristine corporate grounds. The walls were covered in white save for the framing of the building. Forklifts and other corporate workers moved around in quick succession, blocked only by each other and potted plants with organisms neither Lucky or Nickel had ever seen before.

“No, you may not. Follow me this way please.” He said, his smile never faltering as he turned and motioned for the girls to stay close. One of the security guards led the way while the other walked behind the two women.

They marched their way up an enormous glass staircase, the click of their boots against it nearly startling the women as they thought of the normal click their boots made against the steel stairs that stretched across all areas of the campus they worked and lived in. It was odd walking in an area so clean, as if it were built to be looked at but never interacted with.

The trio led them to an enormous office door down the hall from the top of the stairs, gesturing for them to enter. The doors parted, revealing a large office emptied out of anything recognizable as office furniture or items associated with a corporate workspace. Instead, the office contained two bullet making workstations next to each other facing a large robotic arm bolted into the floor. Nickel and Lucky had heard of these machines but they were typically only used in Fountainhead Armory 4-4 in another area of the Iron Reach. While it was easily the nicest factory campus around, that wasn’t saying much given the average standard of living in the district.

The two guards stood beside the entrance as the corpo man walked the two women to the empty stations before clicking some buttons on his tablet. The robotic arm whirred to life with a low rumble as lights flashed across its body and the machine rose and stood at attention, its crooked end hovering over a tray of ammunition components. He turned to face them, still wearing his pasted-on smile.

“Thank you for coming ladies, you do Fountainhead a great service with all of your work. Your outputs have been up the last six months on the factory line, and we would like to determine how much more efficient the line could be if we replaced some of your coworkers with a factory arm. Do not worry, neither of you are slated to be replaced. Rather, it is the belief of some of the Factory managers that one or two of these factory arms in place of several of your slower coworkers will improve the line by a significant margin, perhaps even by 3 percent.” He touched some more buttons on his tablet, activating a clock on the far side of the office wall.

“We’d like you to put together as many bullets as you can at these workstations in an hour while the machine does the same. Afterward, we will use this sample to determine what sort of improvement this addition may make for factory output. Do you have any questions? No? Great, so why don’t we-” Nickel raised her hand with fervor, cutting the corpo man off.

Lucky furrowed her brow and glared at Nickel. She was always doing things like that. Pushing back against management, attending all of the union meetings, advocating for the slower workers on the line. It made Lucky’s stomach turn, especially when she had to pretend to admire it as most everyone else on the factory floor seemed to find it admirable.

“Why do you have us up here doing this? Why not just measure our individual averages and compare that to the factory arm’s?” Nickel asked, eliciting a contemptuous sigh from the man.

“Because Fountainhead asked for it to be done this way, end of story. As I said, you will have one hour to produce as many bullets as you can at the workstations provided. I suggest you focus on the task at hand rather than asking pointless questions. You’re a ‘child of this factory,’ as the unions like to say, right? So do your job.” Lucky nodded in agreement as the man wandered out and beckoned the guards to follow, shutting the door behind them.

The clock beeped and the two women walked to their stations, activating the presses and other tools attached to the workstation and fell into their routine, putting ammunition together as the clock ticked down and the robot performed its work.

Lucky looked over at Nickel, her dark hair tied back in a tight bun to keep it out of her eyes. Lucky had shaved her head a long time ago, a signal to her supervisors that she knew what was required of her. Those who worked hardest got off-campus privileges, and at this rate she was close to getting them, especially now that she knew she was a high producer on her floor. The only problem was Nickel was too, and if she was associated with her, especially since everyone knew now Nickel was in love and had proposed to her, she wasn’t sure she’d be allowed off campus anytime soon.

“Why do you do that?” Lucky asked, her eyes remaining focused on her work.

“Do what?”

“Stir the pot? We got asked to do a special assignment, got brought to a wing of the factory no one else gets to go to, and you bother this guy with questions?”

“Lucky, I love you but you need to stop being so naive. These people need to be reminded we have some power. It isn’t much, but asking questions, taking interest, pushing back–it all reminds them we’re people and not robots, like that thing.” Nickel grumbled as she nodded her head towards the machine working tirelessly on its job.

“Well I love this job. It might get me out of here some day. I want to see more of the city. And if you really loved me you’d get that and not drag me down with you with all the advocating and shit.”

“I want to see the city too, and I thought we could do that together. You said no and I understand, but I’m not going to bow down to Fountainhead in every aspect of my life, we already have so little here in the Iron Reach, why give them what little we have left?”

“Because they might give us something irreplaceable if we do, Nickel! A way out! Don’t you get that?” Lucky felt herself getting frustrated. She slipped her finger near the press and made a defective bullet, bringing her total down as well as her quality score. She groaned and moved fast to make another to make up for the loss.

“Of course I get it, but like that asshole said, we’re children of this factory and that means our coworkers come first, they’re the only family we have. You know, most of us will never leave the campus in our lifetime, that’s just the way it is here. But those of us who do deserve to make it out because we worked hard and tried to bring as many of us up as we could. Maybe you just don’t get that.” Nickel said with an angry sigh. Lucky didn’t hear one bullet press go off out of place. Nickel was producing each one perfectly. At this rate, Lucky was going to look like a slacker next to Nickel and the factory arm.

They pressed on with their task in silence before the clock hit the ten minute mark. Lucky was getting nervous. She wasn’t anywhere near her normal average output, while Nickel was producing her ammunition just fine as if it were just another day on the factory line. Why was she doing so well? All she ever did was anger the supervisors, rile up their coworkers, and make passes at Lucky she begrudgingly accepted. Lucky deserved to be the better producer. She was the better producer.

The clock hit five minutes and Lucky peeked over at Nickel’s station again, her basket nearly full on par with the factory arm’s while Lucky’s box was three-quarters of the way full by a generous measurement. She couldn’t take it anymore, this was unfair, certainly Nickel would see that.

Lucky stormed over to Nickel’s workstation and dug her hands into the box, grabbing two handfuls of bullets and dropping them into her own box. Nickel looked on in astonishment.

“Lucky! They measure the counts by gradual weight! They’ll know you did that!”’ She looked over at the door then back at Lucky before walking over to Lucky’s station and lightly shoving her out of the way.

“Here, I’m having a fast day, let me just try and make some of these for you with the time we have left.” She started pressing the casings into the press while Lucky stood beside her. She felt anger boiling over, why wasn’t Lucky the one helping her? Why did Nickel always have to try and help everyone? Maybe she just needed help. Maybe she just needed help quieting down for once.

Lucky seized the back of Nickel’s neck and slammed her into the handle of the bullet press, the hard metal scratching Nickel’s skull as she reeled back gripping her bleeding forehead. Lucky didn’t give her a chance to recover as she leapt forward and wrapped her hands around her neck, choking her violently. Nickel hacked and tried to pull Lucky’s hands from her throat. She clawed at her wrists but received no quarter, Lucky was gripped by something she’d never felt before.

The clock buzzed loudly as the hour completed and the robot shut down. The doors swung open and Lucky let go of Nickel’s neck, dropping her to the floor as she hacked and coughed regaining her breath. She looked up at Lucky in horror as she backed away, her hands still shaking after gripping Nickel’s neck so tightly.

The guards raised their rifles and aimed at the two women, but the man stepped in and gestured for them to lower them, his smile gone and replaced with a look of curiosity.

The man wandered over to Nickel’s workstation, then Lucky’s, taking stock of their total output before looking over at them, staring at Nickel still coughing on the floor and Lucky looking back at him with eyes like a deer caught in the headlights. He chuckled and threw on that corpo smile.

“Well then, Ms. Lucky. Maybe you’re Fountainhead material after all.”