JUNE 2025, FLASH, 1300 WORDS
Prefer to read this as an EPUB or PDF?
Subscribe to Fantasy to support short fiction, and get every story as it drops:
To: JCookmgmt@Nootrum.earth Mon, Feb 1, 2044 7:45 AM
From: HOrmeasadmin@Nootrum.earth
Subject: Staffing Question
Hey Boss,
Hope you had a good weekend.
Just a quick note to ask if it’s an issue that an employee has called out of her shift because she says she’s possessed.
Thanks,
Frank
To: HOrmeasadmin@Nootrum.co.earth Mon, Feb 1, 2044 7:47 AM
From: JCookmgmt@Nootrum.co.earth
Subject: Staffing Question
That’s a new one. By a ghost or a demon?
Reply to me on SKIVE, easier to discuss on DM.
***Entering SKIVE intra-office chat***
HOrmeas: Mon 7:49 AM
I don’t know. She didn’t say. Does it matter?
JCOOK: Mon 7:49 AM
No idea. Seemed like the thing to ask. Do you have coverage?
HOrmeas: Mon 7:50 AM
It’ll be tight. Got one person on vacation & one on paternity leave. Honestly, I’m kinda worried, and there’s nothing in the management manual about it.
JCOOK: Mon 7:50AM
Well, shit. If she doesn’t have a doctor’s excuse, then make her come in and work her shift. If not, she’s fired.
HOrmeas: Mon 7:50 AM
Got it. Thanks. Um…
JCOOK: Mon 7:52 AM
What?
HOrmeas: Mon 7:52 AM
I’ve never had a possessed employee before.
JCOOK: Mon 7:57 AM
That you know of. It’s fine. Treat her like you would anyone else. If we add possession to the list of approved reasons we give paid time off, we’ll never have any staff.
HOrmeas: Mon 7:58 AM
Yes, Sir.
HOrmeas: Mon 12:44 PM
Well, that didn’t go as planned. I told the employee she had to come in and work her shift if she wanted to keep her job.
JCOOK: Mon 12:44 PM
And she didn’t come in?
HOrmeas: Mon 12:44 PM
She came in, but by 10:00, she’d destroyed the mail room, thrown up on a client, levitated another employee. We’re uh, still trying to get him down.
JCOOK: Mon 12:49 PM
…
???
Where is she now?
HOrmeas: Mon 12:51 PM
Some guys in cloaks showed up and took her. They left a card, said she’d be okay in a day or two.
Can we… should we fire her? I mean, if she let herself get possessed once, it’ll probably happen again, right? Don’t-doesn’t. <Sigh> Isn’t it a truism of some kind? I mean, like that disease where you get it once, so you’re more likely to get it again? Your body is more vulnerable to it.
JCOOK: Mon 12:53 PM
Jeez, what the—I don’t know. Let me loop on HR. Hold on.
***MAaron is entering SKIVE intra-office chat***
MAaronHR: Mon 1:15 PM
I haven’t come across this question before. Have you determined the possessing entity?
HOrmeas: Mon 1:16 PM
Yes, I reached out to clarify that it’s a ghost.
MAaronHR: Mon 1:16 PM
Okay, so not a demon or the Devil. It gets sticky with demon/Devil possession. I’ve searched our records and there isn’t anything on file since we’ve gone digital. Give me some time to look in the archives. I’ll loop in Legal too. Back soon.
***JQuellin is entering SKIVE intra-office chat***
JQuellinLegal: Mon 1:41 PM
Margo brought me up to date on your question. You have an employee who has been possessed, and it’s by an entity they self-determined was a ghost.
HOrmeas: Mon 1:43 PM
Yes. In fact, the employee said that she is now actually a ghost.
JQuellinLegal: Mon 1:43 PM
Because of the possession?
HOrmeas: Mon 1:43 PM
Yes.
JQuellinLegal: Mon 1:44 PM
Okay, and did this possession happen on company time?
HOrmeas: Mon 1:44 PM
Not sure. I can ask—
JQuellinLegal: Mon 1:44 PM
No, no. Don’t ask.
I’ll be upfront. It’s going to be tough because since they are possessed by this entity – I’m not saying she’s right that it is a ghost. The cloaked figures seem to go against that. Your employee is not an expert on the occult, are they?
HOrmeas: Mon 1:45 PM
Uh, I don’t think so.
JQuellinLegal: Mon 1:45 PM
Fine. Let’s operate from the position that they aren’t an authority on the occult. But since they are possessed by this entity, it’s likely this entity knows what they know. Okay? So this entity has inside information about the company and its processes, passwords, and client base. Correct?
JCOOK: Mon 1:46 PM
???
HOrmeas: Mon 1:46 PM
Correct.
MAaronHR: Mon 1:46 PM
Is she planning to get clean?
JCOOK: Mon 1:46 PM
Get clean? I don’t think they have rehab for the possessed. Ghost rehab, Margo?
MAaronHR: Mon 1:46 PM
No, Jo’nafon. I meant like an exorcism or something. I don’t want her accusing us of unfair practices or unlawful termination.
Are we terminating her? Is there cause?
HOrmeas: Mon 1:46 PM
No! She’s my best worker – always on time or early, stays late, takes other’s shifts when they don’t want them.
JQuellinLegal: Mon 1:46 PM
Hmm. And that’s unusual for the team, is that right?
HOrmeas: Mon 1:46 PM
Yeah. Morale is um…pretty low. Turnover is kinda high.
JQuellinLegal: Mon 1:47 PM
Well, maybe we can use that. Let’s say normal level of employee behavior is tardiness, cutting off early, reluctance to take on extra work. Whereas this employee… what’s her name?
HOrmeas: Mon 1:47 PM
Marie.
JQuellinLegal: Mon 1:47 PM
Okay, Marie exhibits unusual behavior not fitting with corporate culture, right? She’s doing things we don’t ask her to do – don’t call it going above and beyond, that puts a positive spin on it. Say she’s not operating within guidelines, and it’s causing friction within the team. Has she been put on a PIP?
HHOrmeas: Mon 1:48 PM
A Performance Improvement Plan? No. There’s nothing wrong with her performance.
JQuellinLegal: Mon 1:48 PM
Yes. There is.
She’s operating outside stated guidelines and the scope of the job she was hired for and her actions directly affect the performance and morale of the rest of the team. There. Use that language and start on her review now. Has she done anything else?
I just had a thought: If she’s possessed, then is *she* doing the work or is the ghost? We can cite client privacy as a concern here if we want to push for termination.
HOrmeas: Mon 1:49 PM
I don’t know. We don’t need any member of the public saying we discriminate against people who are dually-inhabited.
JCOOK: Mon 1:49 PM
Dually-inhabited? Is that what we call being possessed now? Back in my day, being possessed was a bad thing. You got called crazy or got locked up until they could fix you.
MAaronHR: Mon 1:49 PM
Back in your day, dinosaurs roamed the earth. Pangea was still a thing.
JCOOK: Mon 1:49 PM
Look here, Smarty—
MAaronHR: Mon 1:49 PM
Don’t say it. In fact, let’s discuss how we’re going to respond to the entire staff about this incident with Marie on a video call. I’ll send a link.
#
MEMORANDUM
Nootrum Interstellar Consulting, Earth Division
To: All Nootrum Earth Employees
From: Jo’nafon Cook, Managing CEO J’n Cook
Date: February 2, 2044
Re: Amendment to company policy
As of the date of this memo, should any employee – human or otherwise – become or suspect they have become possessed by a ghost, demon, or any other entity, known or unknown, natural or supernatural, it is imperative that they notify HR and their direct supervisor immediately.
Once your possession has ended, we require a certificate detailing such from a priest, witch doctor, or other certified spiritual practitioner.
Should you experience any or all of the following while at work, you will be subject to mandatory possession evaluation before you will be allowed to return to your duties.
• Lack of due concern
• Uncontrollable need to possess/control another’s body, mind, or spirit
• Victimhood
• Self-Blame
• Desire for revenge
• General bloodlust
• Being too serious
• Not taking matters seriously enough
• Resistance to change
• Consistently living in the past
• Obsessing over the future
Thank you for your understanding and for being a part of the Nootrum Earth team.
Eden Royce is a writer from Charleston, South Carolina now living in Southeast England. She’s a Shirley Jackson Award finalist and a Bram Stoker Award nominee for her adult fiction, which has appeared in a variety of print and online publications, including Nightmare, Strange Horizons, and Apex Magazine. She is also a Walter Dean Myers Award Honoree, an Andre Norton Nebula Award Finalist, an Ignyte Award winner, and a Mythopoeic Fantasy Award winner for her children’s literature. Find her online at edenroyce.com.
Return to Issue #97 | Subscribe to Fantasy
Behind the Scenes with Eden Royce
What was the initial inspiration for this story, and were there significant changes from that inspiration through edits and revisions?
I spent years—decades, really—working in corporate America and have been privy to conversations like these more times than I can count. As for the inspiration for this story, I wondered how a simple question about how to address an employee absence would play out if the reason for said absence was a supernatural incident. What would the people involved do? How would they protect the firm? And what would be the result for the employee who is not even a part of the discussions?
And there were no significant changes from my first draft to this final one. There were a few typos that needed correcting, but that was it. I’ve written many corporate memos in my former life, and the knack must not have abandoned me.
How does this story fit into your body of work—is it similar in ways to what you usually write or is it very different?
My body of work includes a lot of “style flexing”—another term held over from my former corporate life. I write flash fiction, short stories, novellas, and novels for adults and for younger readers in multiple genres and in literary fiction. So this story fits right in!
I enjoy writing widely, and I love what’s called “hermit crab fiction.” In the same way hermit crabs use shells they find for homes, hermit crab fiction uses the format of another style of communication to tell a story. I’ve written stories that look like a recipe, a real estate listing, and in the case of “Corporate Policy,” an intra-office messaging system and memorandum.