Open Call: Book Six game

Short Shifts · No. 06 · Alley Auditions

PROTECTION PLUS IS HIRING

Open auditions in the alley. No experience necessary. Experience discouraged. Your name on every form is Current Occupant, and you are next.

A makeshift audition room built from taped cardboard boxes: a wooden stool on a blue tape X, a softbox light on a stand, and haze drifting under a bare ceiling.

Today’s audition

Warming the water…

Ahead of you in the line

  • a nervous fusilli holding a résumé, laminated
  • an elderly orzo asking anyone who will listen about dental
  • a tall spaghetti doing calf raises against the walk-up’s stoop

This is the table. The line is the line.

Nothing happens until you press it. There is no timer; the line moves when you do.

How it works

  1. Join the line

  2. Answer each station

  3. The verdict is always the same

The rules, in words

The rules, in words

  1. Protection Plus is hiring, in an alley, at a folding table. Ralphie runs the stations. Louie does the culture fit.
  2. There are five stations: the forms, the personality assessment, the practical, the culture-fit chat and the background check. Each one asks a question with preset answers.
  3. Your name on every form is Current Occupant. Nobody in this line is given a number, including you.
  4. Answer however you like. Every answer is noted. The verdict is the same for everybody, every day.
  5. At the end you get your applicant file, laminated, and an email. Both are made only from the answers you picked.
  6. Without JavaScript, the whole audition is below as a printed application packet, with the verdict at the end.
  7. Mark Book Six finished, and something plays after the credits.
Back to the table: the audition, as you left it

The plain version

After the credits

SPOILERS UNDER PROTECTION PLUS Opens when you mark Book Six finished. Coverage: Basic (free). Premium (also free). Platinum Elite (free, but Louie calls you).

After the credits

The alley, after midnight. The folding table. The ring light, switched off.

Louie: “Are we a joke?”

Ralphie: “Jokes don’t keep showing up.”

Referral

Clipped to your file, in a different hand.

The Sewer Gym opens at six. Tony will spot you.

Tony Tortellini, a big folded tortellini in a red tank top, roars as he lifts a barbell loaded with stone plates in a brick-vaulted cellar gym lit by bare bulbs.

The application packet

The plain version: the whole audition, printed, readable without JavaScript.

PROTECTION PLUS · APPLICATION PACKET

Fill in by hand, or read it as if you had.

Name: Current Occupant

Station 1 of 5: The forms

POLICY 3.3: Every applicant completes the form in full. The form is one field.

Name, as it should appear on your file.

  • Current Occupant
  • My actual name
  • Leave it blank
  • Ask why

Station 2 of 5: The personality assessment

POLICY 5.1: Intimidation is self-reported. Honesty is mandatory and cannot be checked.

Rate your intimidation, from “Mildly” to “Nephew”.

  • Mildly
  • Moderately
  • Professionally
  • Nephew

Station 3 of 5: The practical

POLICY 6.0: Cones are company property. Do not intimidate a cone beyond the assessment.

Look menacing at the cone. Choose a pose.

  • The Lean, against nothing
  • The Slow Nod
  • The Squint
  • The Folded Arms, unfolded and refolded

Station 4 of 5: The culture-fit chat

POLICY 7.2: Culture fit is assessed by Leadership. Leadership is assessed by nobody.

Louie asks: where do you see yourself in five years?

  • Running my own crew
  • Somewhere with air conditioning
  • Honestly, I don’t know
  • Right here, at this table

Station 5 of 5: The background check

POLICY 8.4: Background checks examine the background. Applicants are the foreground and are not examined.

Ralphie reads out three fields. Answer each.

Threat level

  • Low
  • Medium
  • High
  • Unsure

Sauce affiliation

  • Marinara
  • Alfredo
  • Pesto
  • Butter, quietly
  • None

Suspicious behavior (Y/N)

  • Y
  • N
  • Define suspicious

VERDICT: NOT HIRED. For the records.

PROTECTION PLUS · APPLICANT FILE

Name
Current Occupant
Intimidation
As answered
Practical
As answered
In five years
As answered
Threat level
Decorative
Sauce affiliation
As answered
Suspicious behavior
As answered
Status
NOT HIRED

For the records.

Subject: Your audition

Dear Current Occupant,

Thank you for your interest in Protection Plus. We regret to inform you that you were too qualified, which is suspicious. For what it is worth, your squint was the best thing anyone did at this table today. Your file has been placed on hold, which is a shelf by the laminator.

For the records, HR.

Back to the table: the audition, as you left it