Oliver knew for a fact that his new co-workers were speaking, but didn’t actually pick up on any of the words.
Instead, their voices became a dull thudding, muffled and hidden somewhere within the brume that hung in the back of his head.
On any other day, he surely wouldn’t have been so cynical and irascible- at least not to this extent- but this was meant to be [i]the[/i] day.

Their first day on the job, as moderators: Four years of academic preparation, come to fruition. 
He’d built the scenario up in his head so very high, that when it fell flat- and it [i]did[/i] fall flat, around the time his commanding officer had said “… and this is the coffee machine”- it took a far steeper drop than it might’ve.
His mood followed suit.

Four years, he’d scrimped and scraped those final marks; Four years, he’d trained during his lunch and break hours just to get a feel for his blasted sword, and four [i]goddamn[/i] years he’d competed with his brother, falling short time and time again.
And for what? To be a [i]barista?[/i]
His father’s jacket had never felt heavier on him.

He exhaled deeply, straightening up in his seat and opening his mouth, to address his comrades, but then…
[i]“…But that twist, would never see coming from million miles away Ollie!”[/i]
Had… had she been talking all this time?
As he pondered this, she grasped his shoulders, and all around him Oliver heard the clatter of his personal bubble crashing to the ground like shards of glass. 
He shrugged her off with a grumble, climbing out of his seat. 

For a moment, he contemplated using his Clawshot to confiscate their brooms: But then concluded that his own bad mood was no reason for anyone else to suffer.
Well, he actually concluded that somebody should probably drop a reality bomb on them, but to hell if he was going to be the bad guy on their first day of working together. 
So, mutely, he passed them by, stepping behind the counter before kneeling down, and sliding back a hidden floor panel. 

A series of brass steps revealed themselves: A concealed, helical walkway which- when he ventured down- would take him to the sleeping quarters. 
Because just beneath the unsuspecting Café E-spresso, the city harboured a secret: The Moderator’s HQ, in all its squalor. 
Well, perhaps squalor was the wrong term, but certainly it didn’t hold a candle to the expansive, expensive interiors of the Admin’s base in central Proto-City. 

It was an expansive circular room- at least twice the size of the café which’d been constructed above it- made up almost solely of brassy and coppery wall panels, all highly polished and yet very unflattering in their reflective properties. 
That is, of course, save for the room’s most Northern point, which was taken up by one long, curved glass panel, which harboured a faint green light, and hummed in strangely dulcet tones. 
It was upon this surface a massive, golden M was posted upon the surface of a silvery shield.
This was the signature of The Moderator Corps, their logo and identifier. 
Upon that screen, the Admins- or other Moderator groups- could contact them, if ever they had need.

Oliver had been told that it was very likely they would ever get a call.

Behind each copper wall panel- for they were slide-able, whereas the brassy ones were not- there was one of eight rooms. 
Seven of them belonged to the Moderators, and the eighth was sealed off permanently for reasons that couldn’t be discovered for love or money, try as Proto-City’s Moderators might.
And in the main room’s middle, there was one solitary brass pillar, covered in small moving pistons and hanging chords. 
In its centre was a glass sphere, in which there was a digital replica of the planet Earth: This is what provides the Café E-spresso its “wifi hotspot”, for it linked right into the planet’s data core.

Oliver cared little for this, though.
Instead, he fell into the wheeled-chair which sat before the great green monitor, and reclined into it with a deep sigh.
“Maybe if I wait here,” he began, tone hollow, “Somebody will call and give me an [i]actual[/i] job. Maybe.”