Trent blindly slapped at the blaring alarm clock. Every swipe knocked something else off of his bedside table and echoed oh so loudly inside his throbbing skull.

Eyes still tightly closed, he finally laid his hand on the body of the clock and found the snooze button. Blissful silence! He groaned and laid back in bed, rubbing his sure-to-be bloodshot eyes while cursing himself for not remembering to turn the damn thing off the night before.

Oh, god, the night before! Now that had been something else. With the news of the merger, he had been concerned about the job he had been offered at BI. It was his dream job and the preliminary interiews had gone well, but the final two were a little less than stellar. He'd been late to the last one, oversleeping after spending all night logged on to the game server he was helping run. The competition was tough, he knew at least four other people--all programmers at least as good as him--who were vying for the same position with BI. When he didn't hear anything for two weeks after that, he'd just about given up hope.

And then he read about the pending merger. Trent knew there'd be a glut of people for every position that had been open at BI and that everyone from DRE would probably be given preference for most of those. He knew he didn't really stand a chance. So he threw himself into to the game.

The game, a prototype MMORPG that he and a few friends from his last job and college had been working on for a couple of years, was almost ready for a public test. It was a futureistic combat and clan oriented military setting focusing on power armor and giant robots. The working title had changed a dozen times over the last two years. Currently it was Robotic Ground Gear Reserve. They figured RGGR had a nice ring to it and, when the time came, they could get it talked about in an online forum or three, round up some beta testers and really put the thing through its paces.

Of course, they'd thought that four times over the past year. Not once did anything ever happen. It was always another revision here, another update there. Trent had been getting a little frustrated with it and his severance pay from his last gig was quickly running out. So when he had seen the posting for a programmer at BI, he had jumped at the chance.

In the months that he'd been focusing on the interview process and cleaning up his portfolio (and his online identity... he hadn't realized just how many not-so-flattering pictures and posts he'd let get out there while he didn't have a daily grind to worry about), things had changed in RGGR. Two of the long-time driving forces left in disgust after a heated argument over map formats and camera view options. The general concensus of the remaining team was that they had been looking for an excuse to leave anyway and that it was probably a good thing because a smaller team meant more profits all around when the game hit it big.

Then there was Noreen.

Noreen Palmer was a name from the past Trent thought he'd never see come across his screen again. Then he saw her come up on a couple of social networking sites as "Someone you may know". He resisted the urge to immediately reconnect. Things had ended oddly between them when he graduated and made a bee line for the west coast and she headed east to do grad school. There hadn't really been any goodbyes and they fell out of touch. Quite frankly, he was afraid she'd be mad at him.

He found out a few months later that she was. But that quickly passed after a few  e-mails where they caught up and let old wounds air and heal. She was still a couple states away, working a nine to five grind as a data analyst for Firedrake Consulting, some sort of think-tank and just finishing up a nasty divorce. It wasn't long before the old banter between them fall back into place and they'd spend a few hours a week chatting over IM or exchanging notes on the various message boards they found they had in common.

Still, he was surprised after a few weeks away to find that she'd joined the RGGR team. Even more surprised that in the short time she was part of it, she'd convinced everyone else to re-tool some of the underlying number crunching. The changes were small, but their impact was huge when it came to game play. As he threw himself back in to his end of the project (modeling the functionality of the combat suits and other weapons), he was pleased to see how much smoother any patches and upgrades proceeded.

The past few weeks were a blur of work on the game and chats with Noreen. Even though he knew he should probably be back on the job hunt, Trent was feeling more excited about RGGR than he had before he stepped away to pursue the BI job prospect. Maybe for the first time since the basic idea for the game was hashed out on a napkin at a local bar nearly a decade ago, he tought it may actually stand a chance of really making it big.

Sleep became a luxury and energy drinks his main sustinance. Over the course of two weeks he nailed down a dozen design and functionality bugs that had been plaguing the project for months. He started researching how to actually run a decent beta test program--complete with volunteers and feedback systems--and how to create a marketing plan.

He was on a roll like he hadn't been in years, riding high on a newly clarified vision of the future.

All of it came to a screeching halt when Noreen showed up at his apartment door.

Her divorce was final and she wanted to celebrate. She wanted to celebrate with him. She'd taken some time off and made the drive to surprise him.

The few days following her arrival were a blur of awkward moments, dinners, alcohol and, finally, a kiss. The days after that, a haze of pulled muscles, tangled hair and at least one noise complaint.

It was after one particulalry active morning that the phone rang. Trent had relectantly answered it and almost passed out before thanking the person on the other end profusely. He'd officially been offered the job at BI. The merger had caused a bit of a delay, he was told, but he was definitely their first choice and should be recieving the hardcopy offer in the mail in the next day or so.

Yesterday, the thick envelope showed up. Last night was huge celebration.

With Noreen by his side, Trent rounded up everyone local he knew and hit four of the five biggest clubs in the city. They bounced from one to the other in two limos, getting curious looks at every turn. They were like celebrities no one knew yet and they were living it up like rock stars.

Unlike a rock star, Trent wasn't used to partying like that. He vaguely remembered getting home sometime around sunrise. It was no wonder he had forgotten to turn the alarm off.

Wait, he thought, why did I have it set in the first place?

Oh. Crap. The news conference!

The offer package had made specific mention of the conference that BI was holding that morning regarding the merger and "some other information that you'll probably find quite interesting."

He bolted across the room to his main computer, nearly tumbling to the floor due to the half-removed pants still around his feet. He fumbled for the mouse and keyboard (both wireless and somewhere underneath a week's worth of mail and magazines) and loaded up the BI feed just in time to see the auditorium empty out.

"Dammit!" He slammed the keyboard back down onto the desk.

There was a sleepy mumble from the bed behind him. "T, come back to bed. What's wrong?" Noreen's tussled hair still managed to frame her face perfectly, the light brown turns falling to either side of her still sleepy eyes.

His annoyance faded and he smiled at her. "Nothing... just missed something I wanted to see. I'm sure it'll be archvied and posted all over in a little while. No big deal."

"That's good." She smiled at him, waking up a little more. "Hey, I didn't want to steal your thunder last night, but I've got some news, too."

He quirked his head at her as he wandered back over to the end of the bed and crawled clumsily up toward her. "Really? What's that?"

"I didn't come out here just to see you. Firedrake is planning on opening a satellite office here and I was checking out some real estate before I came to visit you. The deal closed yesterday morning." He started at her with a senseless smile on his face. She waited for a response. Getting none, she continued, "They're putting me in charge of the office. I'm kinda here to stay."

Realization dawned on him slowly, like mist clearing on a moonlit night, revealing the texture of the moss at your feet--soft, somewhat pleasant, but potentially problematic and a little different than what you'd been expecting. "Really?" he said.

"Really." She paused for a second. "That's not a problem, is it?"

"No," he said with a toss of his head and wave of his hand. Then he looked steadily at her green eyes and smiled. "No, that's not anywhere near a problem."

They were interrupted two hours later by the incessent ringing of Trent's cell phone. He extricated himself from the tangle of clothes and bedding and caught the fourth call on the last ring. "Hello?... Yes, that's me... Oh! Hello sir.... Today?... Now?... Uh, yeah, I'll be there in an hour. Bye." For a moment he stared blankly at the phone in his hand, absently running the other through his hair.

"What was that about?" Noreen asked, positioning herself strategically on top of the rumpled bedding.

"I've got to jump in the shower, babe. That was Mitchel Bender... the Mitchel Bender. He wants to meet with me... as soon as possible."

He hoped the news conference archive was viewable on his mobile and short enough to be watched during his dash across town.