Nickels (16 page)

“Gentlemen,” she started.  She clicked to the first slide. 
“Over the past six weeks, we’ve completed a thorough review of the code for the
aviation controls on the CSAR helicopter.  Today we’ll review the current
status, risks to the project, and finish with a question and answer session.”

She proceeded to discuss the enormous number of issues that
she and her team discovered during their review.  She outlined the risks of not
addressing the issues.  Finally, she informed them the timeline needed to be
pushed back in order to accommodate the amount of coding necessary to address
critical issues.

One of the lieutenant colonels from the Air Force was the
first to speak during the question and answer.  “You mean to tell me this
hasn’t even gone to the simulators yet?  Todd, I thought that was scheduled for
last week.  What happened?”

Niki narrowed her eyes at Todd.  He never changed the
deadlines, even though he agreed to.

“There… Um… Have been a few delays as Niki pointed out. 
However, we’re scheduled to go to the simulators next week,” Todd said.

This was not what the project plan said.  This was
ridiculous.

Kyle frowned.  “We have it scheduled in four weeks.  There
is no way this is going to be ready before then.”

“You’re mistaken.”

Niki watched as Kyle’s jaw tensed.

“Maybe if you spent more time on your work and less time
oogling
the female consultant, you’d know the date is next week.”

Kyle leaped to his feet.

“Outside,” he ordered, pointing at Todd and Niki.

When they got into the hallway, Kyle turned on Todd, inches
from his face.  “What the hell was that?”

“What do you mean?”

“That was completely uncalled for.  I’ve been nothing if not
dedicated to this job.  Where do you get off implying that I’ve been oogling
Niki.  And destroying her credibility like that!  What is wrong with you?”

“You’ve been distracted.  I see the way you two eye each
other.  Clearly, losing track of the date proves you both are not fully focused
on this project.”

Niki spoke up.  “The last project plan I have, dated with
Friday’s date, clearly shows we have four weeks.  Where is this new date coming
from?”

“It’s not new,” Todd said.  “It’s always been next week.”

“It has not.”

Kyle paced back and forth, clearly agitated by the
discussion.

“That’s my point,” Todd sneered.  “Neither of you have been
paying attention.  The date hasn’t changed.  You need to get your details
straight.”

He jerked the conference room door open then shut it behind
him, leaving Kyle and Niki in the hall.

She crossed her arms, bringing one straight up so she could
tap her finger on her lower lip.  There was no way they could have this
simulator-ready by next Friday.  Impossible.  She looked at Kyle.  His face was
red.  She’d never seen him this angry before.

“We better get back in there,” he barked.  “Wouldn’t want to
fuel their false impressions now, would we?”

He held the door open for her.

As the meeting wrapped up, Niki decided she ought to bring
Brian into this one.  She unhooked her laptop from the projector but remained
seated as the room cleared out.  She dialed his number.

“We have a problem, Brian.”

She explained the situation.

“Let me call Todd.  See if we can’t get this straightened
out.”

She hung up the phone and walked back to her cube, not
stopping to say hi to the guys.  She rested her head in her hands.  This day
could not get any worse.  She rubbed her temples with her fingers, trying to
ease some of the pressure.

An hour later, a frustrated Brian called her.  “We have to
do it.”

“Why?  What happened?”

“If we don’t, Helitronics is in danger of losing the
contract.  And if they lose the contract, we lose the contract.”

Niki’s stomach hit the floor.  How could they pull this off?

“Tell me what you need.  I can pull Russell and his team for
this week.  We can work double shifts, whatever.  Tell me what you think.”

“Give me two of Russell’s guys.  Any more than that and
we’ll be tripping over each other,” she said, doubting that they would be able
to pull this off.  Of course, they just had to get it to the simulator, not
make it perfect.  She just hated playing that game—especially when bad or buggy
code could mean endangering someone’s life if it wasn’t caught before going to
the live prototype.

“You’ve got it,” Brian said.  “And Niki, don’t carry this on
your own.  You need anything you tell me.  We’ll get it.”

“I need more time.”

“Well, anything except that.”

The line went dead.  Niki thought she was going to be sick.

Chapter 15

She walked past Doug’s cube.  “Gather the troops and meet me
in room 220 in ten minutes.”

Doug nodded as Niki continued on to the restroom.  She
braced her hands on the sink and stared into the mirror.  How was she going to
pull this off?  It was utterly impossible.

She’d done the impossible before.  She knew what it would
take.  Insane hours.  No interruptions.  Everyone had to be at the top of their
game.

She sighed.  She was already behind and she still needed to
deal with her car.  Her lack of sleep from last night wasn’t helping either.

Closing her eyes, she took several deep breaths.  Then she
opened them.

“You can do this, Niki,” she said to her reflection as she
pushed off from the counter.

Standing outside room 220, she surveyed the group gathered
inside.  Doug, Jake, and Scott sat on one side of the table.  Russell, Chris,
and Jeff sat on the other side.  They needed her to be a good leader, a strong
leader.  She had to do this without showing her insecurity.

“Are you going in?” Kyle’s voice whispered from behind her.

When she glanced over her shoulder, he smiled.  “Thought I
might give you moral support.  And I’m pretty good at brainstorming, too.”

She entered the room, leaving the door open behind her for
Kyle.  As he took a seat at the end of the table, she walked to the front of
the room and stood by the whiteboard.

“Here’s the deal,” she started, cutting to the chase.  “We
need a functioning simulation by a week from Friday for a presentation to the
Air Force on the following Monday.  Today is Tuesday.  And it’s half over at
that.  That gives us eight business days.”

“You’re kidding,” Jake said.

Niki frowned at him.  “What I’m looking for here, is ideas
on how we can get this thing done in eight days instead of the four weeks we
asked for.  If you’re not on board with that Jake, there’s the door.”

Jake shifted in his chair.

“It’s a lot,” Doug said.  “We’re going to have to narrow the
scope if we hope to have any chance of success.”

She nodded.

“He makes a good point,” Russell said.  “I think we have to
look at pulling some of the functionality.  What’s the bare minimum we can
deliver to meet the deadline and keep all parties happy?”

Niki felt some of the weight lift from her shoulders.  That
was exactly what they needed to do.

“I can help with that,” Kyle said.  “And maybe we can get
Alan in here.  He knows the spec inside and out.”

“Go for it,” she said.

Two hours later, the team, including Kyle and Alan,
identified the critical features.  Then Niki divided up the responsibilities
and sent the team off to get started.  As the room emptied, Kyle remained
seated.

“We’ll make it,” he said.

“I’m not so sure.  And I hate playing this game when I know
the Air Force is expecting full functionality.  Are we faking it?”

He considered her words for a minute.  “I think if we are
open and honest about what we’re delivering and what we’re not, it’ll be fine. 
They sat in your meeting this morning and listened to you tell us what we were
facing.  I think the most important thing is to show some reasonable progress.”

She erased their blue scribbles from the whiteboard.  “Do
you think that will be enough?  That they’ll give us the extra time?”

“I think they want to see something tangible.  From their
perspective they were promised something over a month ago.  They have yet to
see enough to give them any level of comfort that Helitronics can deliver what
they’ve promised.  While they understand setbacks, they also won’t throw good
money after bad.  They need to get the next generation CSAR helicopter out to
the field in order to stay ahead of the enemy.  I think if we give them
something tangible, they will have more patience.”

Niki sighed.  Gathering her things she followed Kyle from
the room.  She stopped when she reached her cube.  She noticed her purse on her
desk.  Had she been so distracted she hadn’t even bothered to stow it out of
sight on the floor?

Lifting the lid of her laptop, she composed an email to
Brian to provide the paper trail of their plan just in case.  Twenty minutes
later, after hitting send on one of the longest emails she’d ever written, her
stomach growled.  The clock on her laptop read 4:00 p.m.  She missed lunch. 
She picked up her purse from the floor, remembering her car was still stranded
somewhere on the side of the road.  She needed food.  She needed to get her car
fixed before all the shops closed.  And she needed to start on a heap of
coding.

The car had to come first otherwise she’d be stranded here. 
Taking her purse, Niki walked down the hall towards Kyle’s cube.  No sign of
him.  She checked Alan’s cube, then the simulator room, then the break room. 
He was nowhere.

Standing at Doug’s cube, she asked, “You seen Kyle?”

“Not since the meeting.”

“Darn it.  He has my tires and I gotta get my car fixed
before I can get some lunch and get back to work.”

“Here,” Doug said, tossing her his keys.  “Go get yourself
some food.  Maybe he’ll turn up by the time you get back.”

He told her where he was parked.  She thanked him and took
off to the nearest drive-thru.  She placed her order and was out of there in
ten minutes.

As she pulled into the Helitronics parking lot, she saw it. 
Her car.  She drove by slowly.  The tire was fixed.  After she parked Doug’s
car, she walked around back to check the license plate.  It was hers.  She
wasn’t hallucinating.  How?

She looked in her purse for her keys.  They were gone.  Had
she given them to Kyle this morning in her confusion?  Or left them in his
truck?

Niki was still trying to figure out how her car magically
appeared fixed by the time she got through security and back to her cube.  She
set the bag of fast food and her giant diet soda on her desk before returning
Doug’s keys to him.  When she stepped into her cube again, she saw it—her car
keys and a note.  The note simply listed the parking space number and said her
car was all fixed.

Kyle.

As she munched on the burger, she considered this
uncharacteristic act of kindness.  This was not the same Kyle that put bugs in
her food or toilet papered her house.  Not only had he tried to help her this
morning, but he took care of her tires, and he somehow managed to get her car
here.  When?  How?  The one question she couldn’t understand at all—why?

She finished her late lunch and pushed her confusion aside. 
She would thank him later.  She needed to get into this code.  Putting her
headphones in, she selected her loudest fast paced playlist and started the
music flowing.  Her fingers flew across the keys with amazing speed.  Her mind
was open.  She was thinking clearly, able to solve the logic problems dancing
on the screen before her.

Niki had no idea how long she’d been working until a gentle
knock on her desk drew her attention.   She paused the music and popped out her
headphones as she turned to greet her visitor.

Kyle nodded towards the keys—right where he left them. 
“Just wanted to make sure you found your car before I took off.”

Glancing at her clock, the time read a quarter till seven.

“Yes, thank you,” she said.  “How much do I owe you?  I can
bring a check tomorrow or get some cash out.”

“Nothing.”

Was he crazy?

“That tire was shredded.  It’s not like they could have
repaired it.  How much do I owe you?”

“Don’t worry about it.”

“Look,” she said getting irritated, “I don’t like owing
people.  Just tell me.”

He shook his head and turned to leave.  His voice floated
over the cube wall as he walked towards the entrance.  “You don’t owe me
anything.  Just accept it, stubborn woman.”  His chuckle trailed his words.

Who was this man?  Maybe he was an impostor.  Maybe the real
Kyle was still out there in world somewhere and this guy looked enough like him
that he could fool Marcy.

Naw.  Marcy wasn’t easily fooled.

Either way, he was confusing Niki.  How could the brat that
shoved her into the pool in swim class turn around and fix her tire and not
want paid back.  It didn’t make any sense.  None at all.