Elise fidgeted in her seat. The office space was a little cramped, to say the least; every foot of the room seemed to have some random doohickey or another laying around in it, and whatever the heck was sitting on the desk in front of her looked like it was clearly left half-finished the last time anyone touched it.
A young woman poked her head into the room, a tablet in hand.
“Oh, you’re here already!” she gasped, glancing down at the device. “Hold on just a moment while I get Samantha in here.”
The door clicked shut, leaving Elise again to her thoughts. She still wasn’t quite sure if this would be the right choice for her. Was this really happening? Was she really about to be interviewed for a job when she didn’t even know what she wanted to do yet?
The door opened again.
“Good morning!”
Elise looked up, locking eyes with who she presumed to be Samantha.
“I’m guessing you’re trying for the job offer we pitched to you top-classers?”
She nodded, lifting the printout a little higher for Samantha to see.
Samantha grinned, stepping around and taking a seat behind her desk. “Great! You’re hired.”
“Wait,” Elise made a face. “Wait what?”
“You’re hired,” Samantha shrugged, lounging in her seat. “We know exactly what you’re prepared for already. You were in our classes, after all. Though, you did seem to space out every now and then. Most everyone else around here only joins when necessary for testing using generic test accounts.”
“What about all the other people at the top of the class?”
“You’re all getting jobs. Only three of you, however, will have a chance at unlimited simulation time, free of charge. ”
“…Why three?” Elise frowned, glancing down at the printout. “I didn’t know that you were doing that. It wasn’t really anywhere on the flyer…”
“It’s just a little extra something that Lisa threw into the mix. Didn’t really have much of a part in that idea myself.”
Samantha tilted her head, seemingly focusing on something behind Elise. “In fact, there she is now! How’ve the projects been going, Lis?”
“It’s been alright so far,” Lisa sighed, slumping into a seat beside Elise. She turned her head. “Here already? I wasn’t really expecting anyone to come so soon after I mailed out the flyers.”
Once again, Elise held up the printout of the flyer.
“…Elise. Your name’s Elise, right?” Lisa began, “You were the quiet kid in class. How would you feel if I told you to go ahead and start making yourself a character?”
She glanced toward Samantha. “I think she’ll be a good pick for the task at hand. What do you think?”
It felt too good to be true—how could she, a nobody teen with no idea what she wanted to do in life be selected not only for an on-the-spot job, but also handpicked by her idol to be one of the three people to have supposedly unrestricted access to their flagship technology? Maybe all of this was some dream her mind cooked up after reading the flyer last night. After all, though she wasn’t necessarily dedicated to the field, she was still interested… at least, a little more so than much anything else she’d considered going into later in life.
Still, everything seemed to be falling into place just a little too perfectly. But Lisa and Samantha weren’t the kind of people to pull anything as cruel as pretending to hand her a figurative dream on a platter, were they?
“C’mon, follow me,” Lisa stood up, pushing her chair in. “Let’s get you started.”
Apparently, this was real. She really was about to become one of the three students handpicked by Lisa Garnet, wasn’t she? It’d only been, what, three? Four years since she heard on the news that Lisa had mysteriously reappeared after almost a decade of complete silence? Wasn’t there something about Lisa being in the simulations that entire time? What happened to all that? Was something going to happen to her?
“Elise, you’ve gotta stop standing around all spaced out when you’re walking!” Lisa lightly scolded, “I keep having to turn around and find you again!”
Wait, they’d been walking that entire time?
“Over there, that’s my office. You can choose if you want to have a desk somewhere nearby, or you could… y’know, stick around with me.”
This was getting weird. Lisa seemed almost a little eager to have her stay in the office. Did she see something in Elise that she herself didn’t?
“Would you like to set up your character in the meantime, Elise? We can forget about where you’ll set up for now. You don’t have to yet if you don’t want to.”
Elise shook her head. “No, it’s alright if you want me to pick somewhere to work. And with the character, I… I’ll set one up. Where do I go to do that?”
“Right here,” Samantha grinned, seemingly appearing out of nowhere. She handed a tablet to Elise. “We’ve got it all working through an app now instead of a crapton of menus, so it should be pretty easy to get things up and going.”
“Oh… okay.”
“Alright, you’ve got your account set up now, right?”
“Yes, Miss Garnet.”
Lisa grinned, rolling up beside Elise in an office chair. “What name did you pick?”
“L-Luster Dawn… um, is that alright, Miss Garnet? I know it’s not really a real name, b-but—"
“Yup. It’s totally fine by me if you want to go by that name. You don’t need to call me Miss Garnet anymore, either. Just call me Lisa.”
Elise nodded, turning back to the screen. She still couldn’t believe it. What was so special about her that made her one of the three kids to be handpicked? And she was sitting right next to the person she looked up to, at that—the very same person who was now guiding her through making a character of her own.
“’Kay. Let’s get your character designed. You said your character’s gonna be called ‘Luster Dawn’, right?”
“…Yeah? But… I’m still not really sure if that’s a good idea for a name or not. Do you think I should just go with my own name instead, o-or maybe the username on my email! I—"
“Luster Dawn is a perfectly good name!” Lisa leaned over, spinning the tablet to herself and taking a look. “Now, do you have an idea of what you wanna look like in the simulation? Oh, I never told you which simulation! Umm… hold on a moment!”
She tapped a few times on the screen, spinning it back to Elise. The image displayed was pretty simple, by CGI standards—there wasn’t too much shading going on, the colors were bright and saturated, the graphics were flat, and… ponies?
Lisa placed a hand over the screen. “It’s… a bit tacky, yes, but it’s our most popular by far. I promise you—you’ll enjoy the experience.”
Elise remained silent, staring down at the image between her idol’s fingers. She wasn’t much into ponies, but if it was the most popular choice, then…
“Okay,” Elise sighed. “I-I’ll take your word for it. I... I'll leave you to design my character for me. I was never all that good of an artist myself. Oh... uh, by the way, i-is there any sort of schedule I have to follow?”
Lisa shook her head, looking almost surprised by the question. Maybe a schedule was already printed onto the flyer? O-or maybe she was just anxious. After all, this was the first time any students were being hired into the company.
“Nope. Feel free to come and go any time you’d like.”
Still, something felt a little off about her.
“So, how did the first interview go?” Twilight sipped her tea. “Er, application… student… thing?”
Lisa made a face, shaking her head. “It went alright, I guess. Kinda screwed it up a little. Anyway, I think I’m gonna head off for a bit. You know how to reach me if you need anything.”
“Lisa…”
“You know I still can’t completely let go, Twilight! And besides, it’s not permanent anymore like before. It’s… it’s just my little happy place, so to say.”
Twilight rolled her eyes, waving Lisa off. “Well, so long as it doesn’t get in the way of your everyday life, I won’t take any trouble with it.”