Getting inventive with the dress code
There is a Galactic adage: if you want something done, tell a human it’s impossible.
Kasib Campbell had purchased the JOAT conglomerate and decided to begin bringing order to the naturally chaotic JOATs at Amalgam Station.
Shayde, somehow always by his side, was seething. She’d tried to warn him, and he’d dismissed it as one of her many mental disorders. But, right now, in this room, a Campbell had come to turn their world upside down.
“You are all professionals,” said Campbell. “But when I look at you, I do not see professionals. I see a discordant spectrum of loose cannons and that image. Must. Change.”
The big screen showed a rotating average humanoid in a work unitard and a coat. The unitard and majority of the coat were Engineering Blue. The shoulders and sleeves displayed a regulated rainbow with the colors lined up neatly and symmetrically as they marched through the majority of disciplines.
Rael could tell that all of the JOATs hated it on sight.
“Since the majority of JOATs are Engineers, the engineer design is the default. If your discipline is different…” the image’s main colour flipped through some popular ones. Medical red. Services orange. Food Prep yellow. “A more readable uniform is available for you. A copy of the dress code has been sent to your inboxes. Be in your uniforms by assembly tomorrow. There will be penalties for deviations from the dress code, and the assembly rules.”
*
“Aw fook that,” Shayde said for the umpty-fifth time. They’d retreated to her Ambassadorial office to absorb the enormity of the change. “Anal retentive, OCD, pick-ass fookain CAMPBELL! Get this. We have tae assemble in alphabetical order. No more chummin’ wi’ yer pals or neighbours. No talkin’ in assembly. No food. Is he mad? Those meetin’s go on fer ages. No knittin’?”
Oh, that had to be some variety of a last straw. JOATs measured how long an assembly went by how many people were doing something with yarn. Rael was going through the minutia of the dress code while Shayde pored through the code of conduct.
Aha. A loophole. If anyone knew how to exploit it, Shayde would. “It says here, Small articles of individual heritage are permitted to be displayed on the uniform, so long as they don’t exceed two articles per individual.”
Shayde slowly grew her Ominous Grin of Doom. “Ooh aye, that’ll do nicely. Very nicely indeed.”
“Do you need help shopping?”
“And risk ye stoppin’ me?”
*
The JOATs were not happy. The uniform did nothing to flatter any body type and was equally ugly on everyone.
Shayde marched up to him and determinedly stood by his side.
“What are you doing here? The esses are on the next row.”
“Aye. I want tae be noticed.”
“What are you wearing?”
She pointed at the simple decoration keeping most of her hair in order, “Sioux hair decoration, adequate fer me station,” and then to the cloth wrapped diagonally around her torso. “Clan MacDonald war tartan.”
The Campbells, Rael recalled from ancient Terran history, used to have a long-standing war with the MacDonalds. And nobody held a grudge like the Scots.
Kasib Campbell mounted the dias like any dictator proud of their work. Peered down his nose at the rigid ranks of JOATs until he spotted the one person where they didn’t belong.
“You are out of order,” he said. The screen behind him picked Shayde out. Highlighted her for all to see.
“What are you going to do about it, Campbell?” she demanded in perfect Old Doric.
Blink. Something… changed.
Shayde had a natural affinity for altering reality on a temporary basis. Most of the time, she could control it.
This time, he wasn’t certain that she had.
Now they were standing on a fog-wreathed moor amidst the stench of blood and woad and sweat. Shayde at the head of ranks upon ranks of pissed-off JOATs, Rael at her side.
…the weight of a battle-axe and a shield in his arms…
…the feel of a tartan across his shoulder…
…the distant sound of bagpipes…
And Campbell, alone, opposite them all.
Here and now, in this instant, they were all MacDonalds after the blood of their ancient enemy.
Campbell went stone white.
Blink.
Everyone was back where they were as if nothing had happened. All that was left was the lingering miasma of bloodlust. Hanging in the air like the Cheshire Cat’s smile, only far more malevolent.
Kasib Campbell had wet himself.
Anger turned to laughter. Thousands of JOATs gave voice to their mirth.
Campbell fled the stage. The station. And then any notion of organizing the JOATs at all. Rarely to be heard from again.
It was surprisingly easy to gain permission for the bonfire to burn the hated uniforms.
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