Chapter 6: The Cracks Begin to Show

I arrived at the office forty-five minutes early, something I'd never done in my eight months working under Bitsah's tyranny. But today was different. Today, I had front-row seats to a show I'd been anticipating for a decade.

The office was nearly empty at 7:15 AM, just a few early birds from accounting and the overnight security guard finishing his rounds. I made my way to my cubicle, positioned with a perfect line of sight to Bitsah's corner office, and settled in with a cup of coffee and my laptop.

At exactly 8:30 AM, like clockwork, Bitsah strode through the main entrance. Same expensive suit that pulled slightly at the shoulders, same arrogant swagger, same dismissive nod to the receptionist who'd been greeting him politely for months without so much as a "good morning" in return.

He disappeared into his office, and I waited.

8:47 AM: His phone rang for the first time.

Through the glass walls of his office, I could see him answer with his usual brusque "Bits here." Then his expression changed. His jaw tightened, his free hand clenched into a fist, and he said something sharp before hanging up abruptly.

8:52 AM: Another call. This time he let it ring longer before answering, and I could see him pacing behind his desk as he spoke. The conversation was brief, ending with him jabbing the hang-up button with enough force that I could see it from thirty feet away.

By 9:15 AM, his phone had rung twelve times.

Chloe arrived at 9:20, looking harried from the morning commute. She dumped her bag at her desk and glanced over at Bitsah's office, where he was currently ignoring his ringing phone while staring intently at his computer screen.

"He seems... tense today," she observed, settling into her chair.

"Does he?" I kept my voice carefully neutral, though inside I was practically vibrating with satisfaction. "I hadn't noticed."

Jake arrived a few minutes later, followed by the rest of our team. The usual morning routine began—emails checked, coffee consumed, the gradual ramp-up to another day of corporate drudgery. But there was an undercurrent of tension that hadn't been there before.

Bitsah's phone wouldn't stop ringing.

Every few minutes, the sound would cut through the office ambient noise—that sharp, insistent electronic chirp that demanded attention. And every time, we could see him through his glass walls, his shoulders growing more rigid with each call.

"What's going on with his phone?" Jake muttered, not really expecting an answer.

"Probably urgent client issues," I suggested innocently. "You know how demanding the Morrison account can be."

But it wasn't the Morrison account. I knew exactly what it was. One hundred and fifty-three ghosts from his past, all armed with his direct line and a decade's worth of suppressed rage.

At 10:30, we had our regularly scheduled team standup meeting. Bitsah emerged from his office looking like he'd aged five years in two hours. His usually perfect hair was disheveled from running his hands through it, and there were stress lines around his eyes that I'd never noticed before.

"Morning, everyone," he said, but his voice lacked its usual commanding presence. His phone was buzzing in his pocket—he'd apparently switched it to vibrate—and I could see him fighting the urge to check it.

"Let's make this quick," he continued, pulling up his laptop. "I've got some urgent... client issues to handle."

Jake started his status update, but barely thirty seconds in, Bitsah's desk phone rang through the open office door. He flinched like he'd been slapped.

"Excuse me," he said, stepping back toward his office. "Continue without me for a moment."

Through the glass, we watched him snatch up the phone. This conversation lasted longer than the others, and we could see his face growing redder with each passing second. He was gesticulating wildly with his free hand, his mouth moving in what were clearly heated words.

Then he slammed the phone down hard enough that we all heard it.

"Jesus," Chloe whispered. "What was that about?"

"Probably just a difficult client," I said, but I was struggling to keep the smile off my face.

Bitsah returned to the meeting, but he was clearly rattled. His usual razor-sharp focus was gone, replaced by a distracted anxiety that made him stumble over simple status questions. When Sarah from QA mentioned a minor bug in the testing environment, he snapped at her with unnecessary viciousness.

"That should have been caught yesterday! What am I paying you people for?"

The room went silent. Even by Bitsah's standards, it was an overreaction to a trivial issue.

His phone buzzed again. This time he couldn't hide his flinch.

"Meeting adjourned," he said abruptly, already moving toward his office. "I want status reports on my desk by end of day."

We filed back to our desks in confused silence. Through his office windows, we could see him pacing like a caged animal, his phone pressed to his ear, his free hand waving animatedly as he spoke.

"I've never seen him like this," Chloe said quietly, settling back at her workstation.

"Like what?" I asked, though I knew exactly what she meant.

"Scared. He looks actually scared."

She was right. The arrogant confidence that had defined every interaction I'd had with Bitsah was cracking. For the first time since I'd started working here, he looked like what he actually was—a fraud desperately trying to keep his carefully constructed life from falling apart.

At 11:45, something interesting happened. The elevator opened and Mr. Henderson stepped out—Senior Manager Henderson, Bitsah's direct supervisor and the man whose phone number I'd shared with quite a few very angry people the night before.

Henderson was a tall, imposing man in his fifties, someone who projected quiet authority without needing to raise his voice or make threats. In the eight months I'd worked here, I'd seen him maybe a dozen times, always moving with purpose, always commanding respect without demanding it.

Today, he looked irritated.

He walked directly to Bitsah's office and knocked on the glass door. Through the windows, we could see the conversation that followed. Henderson's body language was stiff, controlled anger barely held in check. Bitsah looked like he was trying to explain something, his hands moving frantically as he spoke.

Then Henderson's phone rang.

I watched his face change as he answered. His expression went from mild irritation to genuine confusion to something much colder. He said a few words into the phone, hung up, and fixed Bitsah with a stare that could have frozen hell.

The conversation that followed was brief and clearly one-sided. Henderson did most of the talking, his voice low and controlled but carrying the unmistakable tone of authority laying down the law. Bitsah nodded repeatedly, looking more defeated with each passing second.

When Henderson left, he gave Bitsah one final look—the kind of look that suggested this conversation was far from over.

"Holy shit," Jake breathed. "Did Henderson just tear him a new one?"

"Looked like it," I agreed, savoring every moment.

For the rest of the day, Bitsah was a shadow of his usual self. His phone continued to ring at regular intervals, and each call seemed to chip away another piece of his composure. He stopped answering most of them, but even letting them go to voicemail wasn't helping—we could see him checking his messages with increasing desperation.

Around 3 PM, Sarah from HR appeared at our workstation cluster. Sarah Martinez was one of those HR professionals who actually seemed to care about employee welfare, a rarity in corporate environments.

"Hi everyone," she said with her usual warm smile. "I hope I'm not interrupting anything important."

"Not at all," Chloe replied. "What can we do for you?"

"Well, I wanted to let you know that we're scheduling some confidential feedback sessions next week. Just routine check-ins to see how everyone's adjusting to the post-merger environment."

My pulse quickened. "Feedback sessions?"

"Nothing formal," Sarah assured us. "Just one-on-one conversations to make sure you're all settling in well, see if there are any concerns or suggestions for improvement. Completely confidential, of course."

"Will our project manager be involved in these sessions?" Jake asked, and I could hear the careful neutrality in his voice.

"Actually, no," Sarah said, and something in her tone suggested this wasn't accidental. "These are specifically for team members to provide feedback about their work environment. Management will have their own separate review process."

After she left, the three of us exchanged meaningful looks. HR scheduling confidential feedback sessions without management involvement was practically unheard of. Something was definitely happening behind the scenes.

The rest of the afternoon passed in a strange atmosphere of suppressed anticipation. Bitsah remained locked in his office, dealing with call after call. His usual routine of prowling the floor, checking on everyone's work, and finding fault with every detail was completely abandoned.

At 4:30, his door finally opened and he emerged looking haggard. His expensive suit was wrinkled, his hair disheveled, and there were actual sweat stains visible on his shirt despite the office air conditioning.

"I'm leaving early today," he announced to no one in particular. "Family emergency."

He grabbed his briefcase and headed for the elevator without another word, leaving behind the first peaceful afternoon our team had experienced in months.

As the elevator doors closed behind him, Chloe turned to me with wide eyes.

"Alex," she said quietly, "I don't know what you did, but whatever it was... thank you."

I smiled, thinking about the 153 phone numbers I'd unblocked the night before, the decades of accumulated rage I'd channeled toward its rightful target.

"I have no idea what you're talking about," I said innocently. "But you're right about one thing."

"What's that?"

"It's definitely going to be an interesting week."

Through the office windows, I could see Bitsah's car pulling out of the parking garage, probably heading home to field more calls from his past. The hunters had found their prey at last, and there was nowhere left for him to run.

The cracks were showing. Tomorrow, they would widen into chasms.