Fiction for the weekend. Why? Because there's nothing right that can't be round
By Ryan Skinner (email)
There were serious problems with Gerald Slinn's presentation. Slinn, Southern Europe sales representative for a major thruster manufacturer, discovered the problems the moment he rolled out of bed and planted his feet on the hotel room's shag carpet.
His presentation was spread across the sky. 32 slides, with bullet points, shaded graphics, animated flow charts, avatars and a bar graph showing sales revenue growth month-by-month for two years, now, broadcast on the heavens. At least three were visible through the hotel room window. A fourth appeared to be lurking behind a walnut tree across the motorway.
What's worse, Slinn found out soon enough that the presentation was no longer on his hard drive. He'd never be able to get a colleague to send it either, not at this hour. It was well past midnight at his home office.
So he showered, shaved and dressed, then ate his breakfast in the hotel lounge, all the while feeling grim. On the way to the conference centre, he kept his eyes lowered, trying not to look up. A glance up at a tower clock, or a trackside monitor at the train station, however, revealed the PowerPoint, again. Slinn groaned.
Not only was his presentation painted across the cloudy overcast day, it was also changing, if ever so subtly. The list of features to the new KX-3400 (fuel efficient, modular construction, etc.) now included a reference to "choice of pastel colors". The map of service offices now advertised the company's 24-7 availability for customer support, booty calls and exfoliating salt scrubs. The presentation had lost all integrity.
He begged the young event director, a Romanian exile, to allow him to present the next day. "Please, as you can see, my presentation is written across the sky. What can I do?" She looked at him and frowned: "Okaaaaay, you're scheduled to talk at 2. You'll do great. The mid-afternoon slot."
A man standing behind Slinn nudged him. "I know what you're going through. Last year, my presentation got into the brake lights of cars I was following. Terrible. I've even heard tell of one poor bastard whose presentation materialized only in the reflection of airport toilet bowls." Slinn smiled faintly at the helpful stranger, and slid into the conference hall.
At a quarter past two, Slinn was introduced to a very light applause from two hundred and fifty businessmen. He cleared his throat and began to speak. Despite the fact that a double-layer cinderblock wall lay between his audience in here and his presentation out there, Slinn felt a sudden rush of reckless confidence. It was as if he were a careless student again, and could speak freely about his interests and ambitions.
"Hey!" The shout pierced the bubble of Slinn's confidence. "I've heard this presentation before! This isn't his presentation. It's someone else's!" In an instant, the room filled with chatter and excitement. The police were called and Slinn was asked to show some form of identification. He was only able to produce a handful of business cards, none of which bore his name.
After a cursory recitation of some kind of legal code, the policemen led him out of the room. The man who'd once seen his own presentation in brake lights clenched his fist towards Slinn as he passed and said, lowly: "courage, man."
That evening over dinner, talk at several tables turned at one point or other to Slinn's aborted presentation. Many delegates agreed that Slinn's ideas had some merit, but that they were no longer viable in today's reality. Then they remarked upon the sunset, which was particularly colorful that night.
