Office Space Page #6

[Scene Milton's cubicle. He's organizing papers.]

MILTON:

F...C...P...

BILL:

Hi, Milton. What's going on?

MILTON:

I, I, I, I, I didn't receive my paycheck this week.

BILL:

Uh, you're gonna have to talk to Payroll about that.

MILTON:

I, I did and they, and they said -

BILL:

Uh, we're gonna need to move your desk downstairs into Storage B.

MILTON:

No...I...I...

BILL:

Uh, we have some new people coming in and we need all the space we can

get.

MILTON:

No...no...no...no...but...but...but...I, I, I -

BILL:

And if you could could go ahead and get a can of psticide and take care

of the roach problem we've been having that would be great. (He walks

away.

MILTON:

I can't...Excuse me. I believe you have my stapler?

[Scene The meeting between Peter and the two Bobs.]

BOB PORTER:

It looks like you've been missing a lot of work lately.

PETER:

I wouldn't say I've been missing it, Bob.

They laugh.

BOB SLYDELL:

That's terrific, Peter. I,I, I'm sure you've, you've, you've heard some

of the rumors around the hallway about how we're just going to do a

little (finger quotes) housecleaning with some of the software people.

PETER:

Well, Bob, I have heard that and you gotta do what you gotta do.

BOB PORTER:

Well, these people here. First, Mr. Samir Naga...Naga...

BOB SLYDELL:

Naga...

BOB PORTER:

Naga-worker here anyway!

The Bobs laugh.

BOB SLYDELL:

Mr. Mike Bolton. We're certainly gonna miss him.

PETER:

You're gonna layoff Samir and Michael!?

BOB PORTER:

We're gonna bring in some entry level graduates for us to work in

Singapore, that's the usual deal.

BOB SLYDELL:

Well, it's standard operating procedure.

PETER:

Do they know about this yet?

BOB SLYDELL:

No! No, of course not. We always find it's better to fire people on a

Friday. It's statistically shown that there's less chance of an

incident if we do it at the end of the week. Anyway, Peter, what we

would like to do is put you into a position where you would have as

many as four people working right underneath you.

BOB PORTER:

This is a big promotion, Pete.

BOB SLYDELL:

Huge.

PETER:

So you're gonna fire Samir and Michael and give me more money?

BOB SLYDELL:

Umm-hmm.

PETER:

Wow!

[Scene Michael is messing with the printer.]

MICHAEL:

Yeah. Yeah. That's it. That's exactly what I need. Just give it to me.

Come on. Come on, you little f***er. Let's go! That's what I need.

Let's do that. Let's do exactly that, you little, fu-

Peter walks up to him.

PETER:

Listen... Well, what are you doing tonight?

[Scene Peter's place. Michael, Samir and Peter are there.]

PETER:

There comes a place in a man's life and, uh, maybe that time for you is

now, when it doesn't hurt to think about the future.

MICHAEL:

Uh, no offense, there, Peter, but think about yourself, sport. You're

the one who's been flaking out at work. Whatever that religious

experience or whatever the hell it was, you better snap out of it, or

you're gonna get canned.

PETER:

Yeah. I, I, I...Listen, that virus you're always talking about. The one

that, that could rip off the company for a bunch of money...

MICHAEL:

Yeah? What about it?

PETER:

Well, how does it work?

MICHAEL:

It's pretty brilliant. What it does is where there's a bank

transaction, and the interests are computed in the thousands a day in

fractions of a cent, which it usually rounds off. What this does is it

takes those remainders and puts it into your account.

PETER:

This sounds familiar.

MICHAEL:

Yeah. They did this in Superman III.

PETER:

Yeah. What a good movie.

MICHAEL:

A bunch of hackers did this in the 70s and one of them got busted.

PETER:

Well, so they check for this now?

MICHAEL:

No, you see, Initech's so backed up with all the software we're

updating for the year 2000, they'd never notice.

PETER:

You're right. And even if they wanted to, they could never check all

that code.

MICHAEL:

It's numbers up their asses.

PETER:

So, Michael, what's to keep you from doing this?

MICHAEL:

It's not worth the risk. I got a good job.

PETER:

What if you didn't have a good job?

[Scene A bar. Michael and Peter are there.]

MICHAEL:

Cockos! Samir and I are the best programmers in that place. And you,

you haven't even been showing up and you get to keep your job.

PETER:

Actually, I'm being promoted.

MICHAEL:

What?!!!

PETER:

Yeah, I know, Michael. It's completely unfair. And I realized something

today. It's not about me and my dream of doing nothing. It's about all

of us together. I don't know what happened at that hypnotherapist the

other day; maybe it was just shock. It's wearing off now, but when I

saw that fat man keel over and die, Michael, I realized that we don't

have a lot of time on this earth. We weren't meant to spend it this

way. Human beings weren't meant to sit in little cubicles, starring at

computer screens all day, filling out useless forms and listening to

eight different bosses drone on about mission statements.

MICHAEL:

I told those fudge-packers that I like Michael Bolton's music. God.

PETER:

that is not right, Michael. For five years now, you've worked your ass

off at Initech, hoping for a promotion or some kind of profit sharing

or something. Five years of your mid-20s now, gone. And you're gonna go

in tomorrow and they're gonna throw you out into the street. You know

why? So Bill Lumbergh's stock will go up a quarter of a point. Michael,

let's make that stock go down. Let's take enough money from that place

that we never ever have to sit in a cubicle ever again. Your software

works right?

MICHAEL:

Of course it works. That's not the point. Look, even if it could work,

I don't know how to install it. I don't know the credit union software

loan.

PETER:

Yeah? But Samir does.

[Scene Peter's apartment. Samir's there, along with Michael and Peter.]

SAMIR:

But that's not much money, I -

PETER:

That's the beauty of it. Each withdrawal is a fraction of a cent.

That's too small to notice. Take a thousand withdrawals a day, space it

out over a few years, that's a couple hundred thousand dollars.

MICHAEL:

Just like Superman III.

SAMIR:

Superman III - that's it, I have to leave now, ok? (gets up) I have to

get my resume ready.

PETER:

Get your resume ready for what? Another job where they can fire you for

no reason?

SAMIR:

That's right! If I'm lucky.

PETER:

Look, I don't know about you guys, but I'm tired of being pushed

around. Aren't you?

SAMIR:

Yes, Peter, but I'm not going to do something illegal.

PETER:

Illegal? Samir, this is America! Come on, sit down! Come on! This isn't

Riyadh! They're not gonna saw your hands off, all right? The worse they

can do is put you for a couple of months into a while collar, minimum

security resort! Sh*t, we should be so lucky! Did you know they have

conjugal visits there?

SAMIR:

Really.

PETER:

Yes.

MICHAEL:

Sh*t, I'm afraid. I haven't had a conjugal visit in six months.

SAMIR:

So what do you think?

MICHAEL:

This thing actually is pretty fail-safe, Samir.

PETER:

You came here looking for a land of opportunity. And this is the knock

of that opportunity. Tomorrow's your last day at Initech. You have two

options

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