Commissioned Story: She's the Boss, Ch. 1 (Patreon)

"She's the Boss"
A Commission for NoctisCalem

Part 1

Griffith James struggled to hold onto the number of oversized files in his hands as he stumbled into the lift.  The golden-stylized doors slid closed barely a second after his heels had cleared them and he sighed in relief, trying once again to adjust his hold on the dozen or so folders that were making his arms ache to hold onto.  He seriously wished that the company would just go paperless, just to alleviate the hassle of having to perform these kinds of tasks.  Traipsing up and down the massive building and collecting the, comparative to his small stature, large files only to have to haul them physically up to the top floor, had gotten old very fast over the last eight months he had been employed at Titan and Trading, Limited.  Still, when the boss herself told you to do it, you got it done.

He heard the elevator, the only one sized to him, give its customary ding-ding alert and he hurried to juggle the manilla folders in his hands to try and get his ID badge out from underneath them.  Once he located the plastic-sheathed card, he held it up to the security reader.  He grumbled and jostled in place, trying not to drop anything as the machine took its sweet time in reading his information for the third time today.  He almost dropped a stack of papers as it abruptly shifted in his grasp and he caught it by clenching his straining arm against his belly as tight as he could manage to not let it sink any further down.

With a merciful bee-doop, the scanner confirmed his identity on the card.  The panel above the reader then slid open and a larger one clicked on.  Dutifully, he lined up his face with it and allowed it to take a retinal scan, first removing his glasses.  He saw his face appear on the screen a second later, as haggard and tired as ever.  His dark hair was disheveled, but his crisp white work-shirt, blue striped tie, and slightly oversized jacket, still looked good on him.

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A second later, an automated female voice called out "Hello Mr. James.  Where would you like to go?"

"Hello MAR-C.  Can I go home?" he sighed wistfully.  His boss had been working him especially hard today and he needed to have time to relax.  He knew it was a pipe dream however.  No matter how hard he worked for her, she always seemed to find some extra work for him to busy himself with.  It was like she liked watching him run around so frantically, ever ready with that snappish wit and thunderous voice of hers.

MAR-C, the elevator and indeed company-wide security system, paused before it retorted with, "I'm sorry, I don't think I understood you.  Where would you like to go?"  The bright, cheerful, synthesized voice at least always made him smile.  It made him picture a bubbly, extremely literal woman, rather than a faceless virtual intelligence.

Rolling his eyes, Grif couldn't help but chuckle.  "Office Suite, top floor please," he responded.  "And hey maybe we can go get coffee sometime.  Just kidding."  He was thankful that no one else was around to hear the stupid joke.  One had to make their own humor sometimes.

"As an automated security system, I sadly do not ingest coffee," the robotic voice replied smugly.  "Also I am already in a relationship with RUM-BL."  The floor vibrated as the elevator began to rise.  "I am flattered by your attentions though, Mr. James."

Blinking in surprise, Grif actually let out a laugh, tucking his ID back into his shirt and adjusting his hold on the files.  "I...wasn't aware dating was actually hardwired into your system.  And here I was feeling clever and weird for jokingly hitting on a computer.  Good on you...I guess?  And seriously?  RUM-BL, the mail bot?  The little wheelie-guy?"

"He computes nicely with me," MAR-C replied, ever chipper and synthesized tone just slightly off but always sounding damn near accurate to actual inflections.  The numbers on the side of the elevator continued to climb higher as they ascended the office building.

"I'd love to know who programmed that," he muttered, amused.  A sudden ringing from the phone set into the wall nearby made him jump and he hurried over to it.  There would only ever be one person who used this direct line.  As he shuffled files to get a hand free once again, he observed that, despite the absolutely top-of-the-line technological appliances of recent days, his personal elevator still used an old, black and gold rotary style telephone system.  He liked it, finding it had charm, but it was still rather surprising to see in the current day and age of everything being smarter than the people, Anthro or Human, that used them.  He plucked up the reciever and held it against his ear with his shoulder, adjusting his stance.  "Griffith James speaking," he said, steeling himself.

"Where are you?" snapped a gruff, feminine voice.  He couldn't help but feel a small thrill whenever he heard it.

"Currently riding the elevator back up right now ma'am," he replied dutifully.  "I have the files you asked for."

There was a heavy huff, almost sounding like a trumpet, which he had to fight hard not to grin at.  "At least one person around here can do their bloody jobs properly and with semi-acceptable haste," the woman on the other end of the line muttered.  "Bring them straight to my office."  The phone clicked with a heavy tone before he could reply and he hung it back up.

At that moment, the elevator gave one final ding and the doors began to open.  "Thanks MAR-C," he told the machine as he exited, arms folded tightly once again over the files.  "Masel Tov!"

"Have a pleasant day, Mr. James," she called back as her doors started to slide closed.  A whirring of wheels startled Grif and he nearly tripped as something about the height of his knee whizzed past him and into the elevator right before it shut.  He saw a rounded-topped machine on a single large wheel, blocky body polished white before it vanished from view behind the steel doors.  He heard MAR-C's automated voice immediately reply with, "Hello RUM-BL," followed by several, excited-sounding high pitched beeps before the elevator began to descend again.

Smiling to himself, Grif kept walking down the hall.  He passed the empty receptionist's desk, out with her kids and husband apparently for the second week, and stood before the massive entrance to his boss' office.  He tried not to think how adorable the two robotic intelligences were.  As he waited to be let inside after pressing the door buzzer with an elbow, he couldn't help but imagine a machine, much like Glados from the video game series PORTAL, leaning down out of the wall of the elevator to nuzzle a metal panel against the tiny RUM-BL bot.  The image was just too cute.

Maybe he was just a hopeless romantic and liked to see and picture all kinds of little moments like that, mentally assigning ships and such to the people he passed.  He was usually pretty correct, he'd come to find out, in figuring out who liked who around here.  Or maybe he was just a sucker for that kind of relationship dynamics.  Probably why he himself was still single, given that h mind wouldn't allow for any other woman in his life than one very specific, doomed prospect that he knew would never work out.

The doors hissed as their pressurized systems opened and he stepped dutifully inside.  As ever, his eyes panned up to look at his boss as he crossed over her lavish office floor and stood there, silent and still, with the files she had requested, in front of her colossally sized desk.  She was a stickler for being and acting professional, and incurring her wrath was not something anyone here at the company enjoyed doing.  Her size didn't help the intimidation she exuded constantly either





Elizabeth Johnson sat behind her desk, burly arms crossed over her straining business attire, prehensile trunk currently holding up the phone, a rotary one like in the elevator, to her large ear.  Her expression was severe, Loxon face beautiful even despite it.  She cut her hair short, blonde tresses spilling over one eye but barely reaching much lower, which only enunciated the smoky dangerous air she conveyed.  Her eyes were glazed over and looked irritated as whoever was speaking to her on the receiver continued on for several long seconds.  He shyly tried to keep his eyes down but there was so much of his towering employer that keeping his eyes modest was a daily challenge.

The elephant woman checked off literally every box of what he found attractive in a woman, even with as harsh and demanding as she could be.  Maybe that kind of attitude played into it just a little bit.  Confident women were sexy, and Elizabeth was the sexiest, if scariest woman he had ever met.  Her body, skin colored in a rosy pinkish grey, went so well with her indigo striped business suit, although the fabric must have been sewn with military grade thread to contain the vast curves she had been blessed with.  The front of her blouse, no matter how tightly she buttoned it, always could be seen visibly straining at the seams to contain her, one button away from those mountains within bursting out for all to see.  He thought he saw the lacy outline of a white bra visible before he adjusted the folders in his hands for something else to focus on.

Everything about Ms. Johnson was the textbook picture of erotic and professionalism rolled into one, supersized for all the world to appreciate and also be terrified of.  The short skirts she liked to wear rode up across her thunderous thighs, the image not helped by the pale, lacy stockings she crammed her huge feet into.  There was also the issue that she wasn't just big like most Anthros.  Loxons were the biggest of all Breeds, and Elizabeth towered over his modest 5'9" height at a massive nearly eleven feet tall to the top of her short-haired head.  Even sitting down, the titaness was a vision of strength, power, confidence, and absolute command of both her business and as a woman in her prime.

At long last, she gave out another, trumpet-sounding huff from that trunk of her, again such a cute sound, and she rubbed with one huge, blunt-fingered paw at her forehead.  Her pinkish skin wrinkled at her touch and she growled under her breath.  "I do not care," she snapped, British accent just adding to the overall image of her.  "Mixing compliments with excuses does not endear me to you, Mr. Walton.  I have been waiting for these overhauls for the last month.  I will not accept any more delays.  I'm running a cyber-security and tech-trading company here.  Let your board of directors know that if they want to continue using Titan and Trading equipment, they will fulfill their end of the bargain."  She slammed the receiver down on its gilded holster.

Finally, those storm-grey eyes panned down to the slender Human standing below her.  She recrossed her arms and leaned back in her industrial strength chair.  Her eyebrow lifted, scanning him up and down with calculating precision to detail.  He wished that he had had time to straighten up his jacket and shirt, as the multiple folders and constant jostling had no doubt wrinkled down.  She tapped a finger on her arm for several seconds.

She sighed again.  "Typical."

Immediately, Grif got the bad sense that he had done something wrong.  "Ma'am?" he asked hesitantly.

"I've told you not to call me Ma'am," she snapped.  Her arms unfolded and she leaned across the desk toward him.  "You made sure to get the Murtaug files through to the current date?" she demanded.

He jostled a bit more and nodded.  "Yes, Ms. Johnson.  Should I put them on your desk?"

That legendary eyebrow rose even higher.  "Can you even reach?" she asked, almost sounding amused.  He tried a weak smile in return and she pointed with her trunk at a slot in the front of her desk.  "Feed them in through there," she told him curtly.  He immediately began to do so, slotting each file diligently and carefully into the polished hole.  He heard her chair creak and the floor thudded softly as she stood up and crossed to the other end of the room.  He glanced back to see her filling a large tumbler with some kind of drink which she gripped in her trunk and downed in one gulp.  It would have taken him several long swigs to do the same.

"May I...ask a question, Ms. Johnson?" he asked as he continued to slide in the files one by one.  He heard her grunt from behind him, still standing at her display case of various drinks and tapping away on her phone with the pliant tip of her trunk while her huge paw held it up for her.  He loved watching that trunk work, always surprised by his dexterous and useful it was.  "What did you mean by typical, just now?"

He glanced up her powerhouse, thicc frame, eyes unable to not fixate just a second on her rather amazingly formed posterior and the whippy tail that sprouted out from a fold at the base of her skirts, to her eyes as she turned her head to look back at him.  "That, of all the people I work with, the only one semi-capable of doing their job is my tiny assistant," she replied.  "Utterly frustrating, but at least I know I can depend on one single person."

Grif turned quickly away to resume focusing on the task she had given him, secretly glowing at her back-handed praise.  "I only hope not to disappoint you, Ms. Johnson."

"Best to not," she grunted, snorting again.  "I don't have the time to retrain a new assistant.  Losing you to becoming sloppy and unfocused would do nothing but cause me trouble."

"I'd never want to cause you trouble."  He finished feeding the folders into her desk and turned to cross his arms behind his back in a professional pose.  "Is there anything else I can do for you?" he asked diligently.  He mentally checked the clock, only a few minutes left till the end of the technical word day.  He wouldn't be surprised to need to stay longer however.  When it was her asking, at least, he didn't mind.

She turned to look back at him again from over her shoulder, her large ears waving like sails on either side of her head.  She pondered his question for a moment then turned to face him fully, one big fist on her hip.  The stance she took made everything about her ripple and jiggle wonderfully.  "You mean, before you take off on me?" she asked, voice barbed.

He winced.  "W-well no Ma-  I mean Ms. Johnson," he replied immediately.  "I only meant that I wanted to continue being useful to you as much as I can be."

She rolled her eyes.  "If anyone else asked me that," she rumbled.  "I'd assume they were angling for something.  I noticed you applied for a day off on my PDA.  Eager to get to it or something?"

Grif sank a bit, feeling guilty.  "W-well it is my birthday...tomorrow," he muttered, voice soft but fully aware she had perfect hearing.  "I don't really have any plans for it but..."

"It's your birthday?" Elizabeth asked.  For the first time in probably ever, she dropped the severe tone of voice.  She honestly sounded surprised.  He looked back up at her, nodding.  She plucked up her phone and cycled through various pages, narrowing her eyes to read the text on its screen.  "Spirits burn me," she sighed.  "I forgot about checking the company schedules for those.  HR is going to be the death of me."  She glanced at her desk and then her phone again.  "I suppose I wouldn't entirely be a very reasonable boss to force someone to work on their birthday..."  She sounded begrudging but reticent.  She abruptly reached up and tucked her phone firmly into the crevice of her chest to hold it as she crossed her arms underneath her huge breasts, folding them less sternly.  "And best wishes from you to me."

He blinked in surprise.  "Thank you...!" he stammered out before actually smiling.  Who knew she could be...nice?  That wasn't to say she didn't have genuinely kind and thoughtful moments, but they were usually at a distance.  He'd rarely ever seen her act this way in person to anyone.

"Have any plans for it?" she asked, as if struggling to think of something else to say.

"Not really," he admitted.  "I may order a pizza or sit at home and binge a show or two that I've been meaning to watch."

She waited seemingly for him to continue talking before her eyebrow rose again.  She looked annoyed for some reason.  "That's all?" the Loxon woman demanded.  He shrugged.  "That has to be the most depressing and dull birthday I've ever heard of."  He winced, looking down from her.  He heard her retrieve her phone and tap away on something, as well as a mutter of, "Hate trying to do this schedule thing myself...stupid calendar..."  Then she cleared her throat and he looked up in surprise.  "I'm giving you leave to go enjoy your evening off," she told him curtly.  "However I won't sit here and know that the only person at this company who gives half a damn about their job is going to sit and mope around on their birthday.  I'm scheduling a dinner for you at Rissoues."

Grif's eyes nearly bugged out of his skull and he stared hard up at Elizabeth's stony face.  "M-Ms. Johnson!" he protested but she narrowed her eyes and he wisely clapped his mouth shut on the immediate but polite refusal he had been about to utter.  "Isn't...that place hard to get into?" he asked warily.

"When you know the right people," she replied, voice curt and stern.  "It's a personal favorite of mine, and I want to make sure you know that I..." she looked away for some reason.  "Appreciate the effort you've put into this job."

He had to fight hard not to let his jaw drop open before he blushed hard and looked down again.  "I...deeply appreciate the gesture," he began.  He could all but sense her immediate wariness like a dangerous weight in the air.  "But...That's supposed to be a high-class couple's place, isn't it?"

"I have noticed it caters to certain clientele on most occasions," she admitted.

"Then...respectfully Ms. Johnson, but I'd have to decline your incredibly gracious offer.  I don't think I would have much fun going to such a fancy place by myself.  It would just remind me that I don't have anyone to go with."  He bowed his head, exposing his throat to one side as the traditional gesture of deference to Anthros.

"Who said you would be going alone?" retorted Elizabeth.  His eyes, firmly fixed on her feet, which were currently crammed into high-heels somehow, went utterly wide.  "It is not a request or an offer, Griffith."  He looked up at her utterly shocked to see an only slightly satisfied smirk stretching her lips beneath her trunk.  "It is an invitation to share a meal with your grateful employer on your birthday.  You may even call it a date if you are so inclined."  Her eyebrow rose as high as it ever had, eyes glinting beneath her heavy dark bangs.  "Still going to decline my offer?"

His mouth really did drop open.  For several long seconds, all he could do was stare.  In all of his wildest dreams, a dinner date on his birthday with his boss, the business woman killer with curves, had never once dared to cross his most fevered imaginations.  His smile spread and he shakily stood up straight.  "W-well in that case," he choked out.  "I'd have to be the biggest idiot in the world to turn you down."

"Good thing you've never once seemed to be such an idiot," she hummed.  Elizabeth looked so utterly pleased with herself that her trunk curled into a delightful circle beneath her chin.  "6 o clock, black tie, I'll have a company car come pick you up."  He nodded eagerly and she marched past him to her desk where she sat once again and opened a cabinet to pull out one of the files she had requested.  "You are free for the evening, Grif."

Beaming more than he ever had in his life, Grif gave her a bow and marched smartly from the office.  Her doors boomed closed behind him as he tapped the elevator button.  Only once inside did he allow his nearly overwhelming wave of giddiness, excitement, trepidation, and nervousness to break forth and he hid his face in a hand, giggling under his breath.

"Hello again, Mr. James," said MAR-C.  "It is now 5:31.  Shall I clock you out for the day?"

"Y-yes please," he stammared out, entire body shaking.  He was already mentally preparing outfits, what cologne to wear.  He held out his ID and heard MAR-C read it off with her scanner.  Shifting his weight, his foot tapped something on the floor.  Immediately looking down, he saw RUM-BL the mail delivery droid parked in the corner of the room.  The bot's top panel opened and the pair of LED eyes emerged from it to blink up at him, chirp once in greeting, then reclose.  He giggled again.

He took the train home and immediately set to preparing himself for the following day.  He could not in his entire life of over 27 years remember looking forward to a birthday more in his life.  A date with the boss...maybe his luck really was turning around after all?