#fortuna hacking

He huffs. “So what if it is?”

“So… is this the real you, then?”

“I wouldn’t say that.” He moves to rest his chin on his hand, the same hand that was dangling just a moment ago. “Part of me, at least.”

“It’s all part of you. Wether you like it or not… right?”

He turns to look at you, lazily. “That’s far and beyond what a secretary should be asking a superior, no?”

“And yet, you’re not stopping me.”

Togami hums one more time. “And so what if I’m not?”

“So… there’s no what without a why.” 

“You don’t need to sound so esoteric. If you’ve got something to tell me, just say it to me.”

You could go on forever. About the things you’ve got to tell him, that is. About how his shoulders slump when he’s on vacation, but only to here. Only now, in a small cottage, a pastiche of a commoner’s life. An idealized, manicured view on it. 

You want to tell him that, when you had first been hired, you thought of him as no different than the rest of them. You want to tell him that, over time, you’ve noticed things that made you think of him as a type of man most don’t know him as. You’re not sure which would make him more upset, is the thing. Your dismissal. Your observations. Neither constitute a safe choice. 

And you like your job. It’s the only job you think you’d be able to keep longterm and be happy in.

So you tell him neither of those things. Instead, you smile.

“I’ve got to tell you… that you’re not subtle at all. You bring me along with you to these vacations, just in case you need a secretary.” Alone to these vacations, an isolated mimicry of a common man’s life. The downside is, you can’t just rent a normal family’s apartment. Simply by the virtue of these services and who they cater to, no one would ever do that. Most people of your class would be fine with this, but I can tell you’re not. You ask me about my apartment; do you even know how often you do it? How is it doing, have I cleaned it up yet, how’s the plant you gave me and can I send pictures? It’s odd. It was always odd, but then I realized why you’d been doing it. But I can’t tell you any of this, how unprofessional would that be? And I’m not certain enough to take the risk. So… I’ll only tell you part of the truth.

“I can tell… you just want me to have a vacation too, don’t you?” You smile, wide but not too wide. Maybe a little too wide, but maybe the inauthenticity is the point. “You don’t want me to do any work for you at all! You just say that so you can bring me on a vacation and pay me for it!” 

Togami means to scoff, but it comes out more as a sputter. “It— and so what if I am?!” 

You laugh.  “Is that all you can say?!”