I clocked in a half-hour late the next morning. I didn't see the point in rushing into the office just to quit. There to greet me at my door was another sketch, this time of Jack flashing his gun at me with my likeness lying on the floor, tongue lolling, eyes crossed out, and swarmed by little labels like "baby," and "I pissed my pants." It was not lost on me that the gun in question was strategically placed over his crotch. Nice one, Dr. Freud.

I braced myself for another jump scare, but when none came, I decided to check the hallway just to be sure. Having found neither hide nor greasy hair of him, I unlocked my office door and took a seat, wasting no time in drafting my resignation letter.

"Not cool," said a black blur, materializing from behind my chair.

"FUCK! Jesus. Fuck," I screamed, whipping around to face him. "Can you just fucking shoot me next time? It's kinder."

"Why are you quitting," he asked, conveniently ignoring the state of near cardiac arrest he'd thrown me into.

"Because I don't want to get shot at work, okay? Leave me alone."

"I wasn't going to shoot you. You're cool," he whined. He looked down at the floor, shoulders slumped and pouting. "I was just showing you because I thought you'd like it."

"Too bad. I don't swing that way," I said, which got a laugh out of him. "Seriously though, I'm not interested in hanging around someone who could take me out the second I pissed him off."

"Then don't piss me off. It's easy."

"No it's not. You get pissed all the time. Everyone here is terrified of you because every time there's a slight inconvenience, you go apeshit. And I don't want to deal with it. So I'm quitting." I turned back to my letter only to hear the characteristic 'click' of a pistol cocking.

"No. You're not," he said coldly. I felt the muzzle of the gun against the back of my head.

"Yes. I am," I said, voice shaking uncontrollably. "With this letter, or that bullet. Either way, I'm leaving." I tried to pick my pen back up to write, but my hands shook so badly I could barely hold it, let alone write legibly. I took a deep breath to try to steady myself. I'm not a brave person, but I am stubborn, and I meant it when I'd die before being forced to stay against my will. I felt the gun pull away from my head and was finally able to continue working.

"Noooooooo," I heard him cry, softly. "No. You're cool. Y-You're supposed to stay here with me." His voice twisted at my insides, like he'd reached deep into me and taken hold of my intestines, but I doubled down, determined not to let this little creep get the better of me. He'd watch me resign, or he'd watch me die. Those were his options, and I was not open to negotiation.

I'd put the period on the last sentence of my letter and swiveled around to get up. Although I did my best to avoid looking at him, I still saw his small, slumped figure, now looking especially frail and childlike, the pistol hanging impotently at his side. I speculated for a moment whether he knew what he was doing, and realized quickly that it didn't matter. My resolve died right there. "I don't want to kill you," he said, his voice breaking. "I just want you to stay."

"How much," I asked, cursing myself for even considering trying to bargain with this lunatic.

He sniffed and whipped his nose with his sleeve. "A lot."

I couldn't get over just how much he'd regressed. Maybe this was some sick game he was playing to gain sympathy, but it didn't feel like it. He wasn't acting like a child. At that moment, he was a child. A child with a gun.

"Put the gun down," I said, doing my best to channel my own dad. God, this was so fucking weird. When he hesitated, I repeated, more firmly, "Put. The gun. Down. Then we can talk."

Reluctantly, he reached over to my desk and placed the gun next to me. "Thank you," I said, then gestured to a small chair in the corner of the office. "Have a seat." He shuffled obediently to the chair and sat down, wiping tears that had formed in his eyes. I rolled my chair closer to his, inspecting his face for any sign of deception or malice. There was none. Just snot, tears, and desperation. I handed him a tissue from my desk.

"Why does it matter so much to you where I go? I'm just some guy that does code. I don't like weapons or hurting people like you do. Hell, I only took this job to get out of my parents' apartment."

He blew his nose and clutched the used tissue in his hand. "Then why'd you ask about the plane," he asked, "betrayal leaching into his voice.

"I don't know," I shrugged, still avoiding his direct gaze. "It's kind of cool from a purely technical standpoint. Besides, someone had to get you to stop throwing shit."

"That's stupid," he said, bitterly. "You shouldn't have said anything if you didn't mean it."

"Maybe you're right," I said, finally getting up. "Goodbye, Jack." I walked to the door, then turned to look back at him. He hadn't moved from his chair, his face covered with his hair.

I shut the door behind me and started down the hallway to HR. I was surprised he didn't get up and hound me the whole way there, but I made it to the elevator and up the three floors without incident. However, when I got there, I was greeted at the door by a secretary who said that Robert Nicholson, Chairman of the Board himself, was on the phone and wanted to speak to me. I told her not to bother, as I was here to hand in my resignation, but she was insistent that I speak to him.

She led me into the reception area and handed me the phone from her desk.

"Hello," I said, tentatively.

"Hi. Is this Mr. Kevin Neumann," asked the voice on the other line, way too chipper for my liking.

"Yes," I replied.

"This is Bob Nicholson," said the voice again, dripping with false affability. "I heard you're looking to quit and I was wondering if you wouldn't mind stopping by my office for a quick chit-chat before you head out."

"Is this where I sign over my right to sue or something?"

"Goodness no," he said, laughing. "I just wanted to see if there wasn't anything we could do to change your mind. You've proven yourself extremely capable in the short time you've been here, and I was hoping to keep you around."

"I don't think there is," I said.

"Would you mind telling me why you're so determined to leave?"

"With all due respect, sir," I said, straining to maintain my composure. "I feel that working in close proximity to a petulant man-child who casually carries weapons on him is hazardous to my health."

"I'm sorry to hear that. Still, I think you should come up to my office to talk. I'm free at the moment. You know where to find me?"

"Yes, I can find my way."

"Good. I'll see you in a few minutes."

My first thought was that my dad had tipped him off. He wasn't thrilled about my giving up on the job so easily, and probably got a hold of Nicholson in an attempt to bribe me into staying. Still, part of me felt uneasy about the call, like I was walking into a trap of some sort. I didn't see how he could be any worse than facing off with Jack, so I pushed past the feeling and made my way back to the elevator.

Nicholson's office was on the third-to-last floor of the building with the other executive suites and board room. I'd been up there a few times with my dad when I was younger, and found my way around fairly easily. The walls and office door were large panels of glass with a large gilded push-bar in the center. I found him sitting at his desk, hands folded expectantly.

"Come in," he said, rising to meet me. He shook my hand and gestured to a chair next to his desk. "It's good to finally meet in person. Your father's told me so much about you." Great. So I didn't have to worry about pretending I wasn't a loser. Awesome. "Would you like anything to eat or drink? I can have my secretary order for delivery."

"No thanks," I said. "I don't think we'll be very long."

"Let's hope you're right. You caused quite a stir letting Dante know you're quitting this morning," he said, leaning back in his chair.

"Oh. Did he pitch a fit again?"

Nicholson laughed. "You could say that."

"Couldn't help it," I replied. "He ambushed me in my office. I didn't even see him come in." I wasn't sure why I was starting to feel defensive. In approximately thirty minutes or however long it took for Nicholson to say his piece, none of this mess would be my problem anymore.

"Yea, he's a tricky fellow, that Dante."

"More like psychotic," I said, not bothering to hide my irritation. "I've only seen him a handful of times and I'm already sick of it."

"I was trying to be diplomatic," Nicholson replied, gruffly. "The fact of the matter is that you're not the only one who's tired of his outbursts. However," he leaned over the desk and lowered his voice a bit, as if letting me in on a big secret, "You are the only one who's ever snapped him out of one without outright giving in to him."

"It wasn't a big deal," I said. "I hardly did anything at all."

"Well, whatever you did, it got through to him, which is why I was hoping to convince you to stay on with us."

I sighed irritably. "Or you could just fire Jack and solve the problem at its source, but what do I know?"

Nicholson frowned. "Not enough to be so flippant. Here." He beckoned me over behind his desk and produced a file from one of the drawers. The thick manilla folder was practically falling apart trying to contain the pile of documents. "This," he said, "Is Jack's file. It contains his history, personal documents, tax records, and health information. I want you to flip through this and then tell me you'd still risk firing this guy."

"Health stuff," I asked, confused. "Isn't that supposed to be confidential?"

"It is," he replied, "But you're not leaving this office without signing an NDA, so I'm not too worried." Aaaaaaaand there it was.

I flipped open the top of the folder revealing Jack's birth certificate. 2/28/62. Mother: Beverly Dante. Father: Unknown. Next were the reports from the hospital and foster home. He was born prematurely to a homeless woman who didn't even know she was pregnant. Within his first few years of life, he'd exhausted multiple foster parents and was placed in an institution for mentally disturbed children, where he lived until, at age seven, he was placed in a higher security facility for killing another child.

I paused for a moment to take it all in. It wasn't the portrait of Jack's childhood I'd expected, though his early propensity for violence was not at all surprising. I guess I'd just assumed he was another nepotism hire like me, that he'd been spoiled into believing he was the biggest, baddest, most intelligent person in the world. Turns out he was just a crack baby who grew up in an institution. And his birthday. It didn't add up. There was no way he was only twenty when he'd already had ten years of work under his belt.

I skimmed past a number of other documents detailing psychological screenings, mental acuity tests, and school and institutional behavioral records before I found the records detailing his employment at CHAANK. Although he continued to live in a facility until he was eighteen, his age at the time of his official hire was eight. My heart dropped to my feet as I read over his employment forms, his scribbly oversized handwriting filling the page and spilling out into the margins, just like the rest of him.

I closed the folder, unable to keep reading. "Did you know," I asked, voice shaking all over again.

"About his violent record? Yes," he said.

"And you brought him in anyway?"

"His talent was obvious. I knew he'd just rot in jail if I didn't snatch him up." I wanted to wring his neck. Jack was an asshole and apparently a murderer, but the kind of evil it took to seek out a mentally disturbed orphan to put them to work was on a completely different level. I took a deep breath, resolving not to rock the boat. Not immediately, anyway.

"And now you want me to reign him in for you," I said, trying to sound like I was joking.

"I'll make it worth your while," he said. I leaned in, hands folded in the same 'lets' get down to business' fashion his were.

"Double my salary," I said.

"Done."

"I want insurance that will resurrect me from the dead and cover the inevitable therapy appointments I'll need working with Dante."

"Alright. Anything else."

"I want my job formally updated to reflect the fact that I'm Jack's new babysitter. I can code, or I can keep an eye on Jack, but I will not be able to do both. I would also like four week's vacation, not including sick or personal days."

"More than fair. Is that it," he said, smiling.

"That's about all I can think of."

"Well, the way you spoke on the phone made me think you'd drive a harder bargain." He laughed, satisfied that he had bought yet another human being.

"You have some legal paperwork for me to sign now I suppose."

"Indeed I do," he said, pulling a form from another, much smaller envelope on the side of his desk. I looked it over. I didn't see anything aside from the standard legalese of the NDA.

"And I'm supposed to take your word that you'll keep up your end of things if I stay?"

"Just until the end of the week. I'll have your new contract drawn up by then."

"And if you don't, I can quit?"

"You can quit at any time, regardless. If you think about it, I'm the one taking all the risk here," he said. I smiled and nodded and I signed the form and slid it back to him.

"I'm holding you to Friday. If I don't have a new contract by then, I'm done," I said, sternly.

"Of course." Nicholson smiled and walked me back to the door. We exchanged pleasantries and I was very proud of myself for not projectile vomiting on him.

"By the way," I said, making my way to the elevator, "You can tell my dad I'm onto him."

Nicholson looked confused. "Onto what?"

"He told you I was quitting, didn't he?"

"No," he said. "That was Jack. He called and threatened to blow up the building if I didn't get you to stick around and, well," he chucked, "You know how he is."

I gave a lukewarm laugh and turned away. The amount of attachment Jack seemed to have toward me was baffling. We'd barely exchanged words. But, then again, he was insane, and, from the look of his files, lonely. And I'd have more than enough time to ponder his psyche now that I was the official Jack whisperer.