**Ian**

Ian unzipped his backpack and pulled out a reusable container with three Oreo cookies inside. He set the cookies next to his keyboard and opened an online dating app on his phone.

"Break time already?" Mouth asked.

"Yep," Ian replied without taking his eyes off his phone.

"Three Oreos again?"

"Yep."

"Double stuffed?

"Yep."

"What if you want four Oreos?"

"Nope."

Mouth scratched the crown of his head and scrunched his nose. "Are you some sort of serving-size stifler or something?"

"It's stickler, you idiot," Sloth corrected from his desk, not taking his eyes off his computer. "He's not rationing Stifler's mom."

Ian laughed and shook his head, then directed his attention to Mouth. "Smaller portions are more satisfying. Studies have shown that each bite of food will be less satisfying than the bite before it."

Sloth threw his head back and shook the crumbs at the bottom of his family size bag of chips into his mouth. "Choke on an Oreo, Data."

"The odds are not forever in our favor," Mouth jested. "He only has three."

Ian chuckled to himself and bit into an Oreo while Sloth craned his neck to see what app was on Ian's screen. "Is that OKCupid I see?"

Ian swiveled his chair so his body blocked the phone from Sloth's view. "No."

"Prove it," Sloth challenged. "Prove you're not Finch'ing MILF on that thing."

"They'd have to be 60-year-old grannies for Data to be Finch'ing MILF." With a huge grin and raising his eyebrows multiple times, Mouth added, "Data, is there something you'd like to tell us?"

Knowing it was easier to surrender than continue a banter battle with his coworkers, Ian swiveled around in his chair. "Fine. It's OKCupid. Happy?"

Both Sloth and Mouth wheeled from behind their desks and shuffled towards Ian, still seated in their chairs. Sloth pointed to Ian's large monitor. "Bring up the catalog of O-K-I'm-Desperate females on your desktop."

Ian tossed his cell in his backpack. "I'm not--no! I'm at work. It's not professional."

When Sloth reached Ian's computer he started typing something on the keyboard. "What are you doing?" Ian asked.

"The beauty of being a tech nerd," Sloth began, "is nobody ever has to know what you're pulling up on your computer."

Ian slouched in his chair with his arms crossed in defiance--Sloth seated to his left and Mouth to his right. "Password," Sloth demanded after pulling up the OKCupid website.

"No," Ian insisted. "I can choose dates by myself."

Sloth picked up the reusable container with two Oreo cookies and gave it a shake. "So what's your ration? One every six months?"

Ian became uncomfortable with the fact Sloth's sarcastic comment about his dating life was dangerously close to the truth. He felt obligated to defend himself--to himself. "It takes time to gather people's unique qualities--and--and then calculate the pros and cons of how compatible they'll be based on the projection I have for my life."

"Da fuck?" Mouth stared at Ian with a curled lip.

Sloth contemplated Ian for a moment, then asked, "How long has it been since you've had a--projection?"

Mouth snickered. "Or are you still calculating data to find the perfect equation for your--projection."

Ian shook his shoulders to give himself more space between his prying cohorts, then furiously typed on his keyboard. "You two are assholes." Ian's OKCupid profile popped up on the screen.

Mouth and Sloth gave Ian's search criteria for women a quick glance. "Why on Earth would you narrow your search to only women from the tech field?" Sloth asked.

"We'd have something in common," Ian insisted. "I've dated women not in tech before. There's a disconnect that happens."

Mouth clicked through several profiles marked as potential matches for Ian. "Can anyone tell me why are most of these women are searching for a partner in crime? Do they want you to help them rob a Gap after exposing yourself in yoga and doing crack at a nail salon?"

Ian grabbed the mouse away from Mouth and closed the browser. "Thanks for your interest in my personal life, gentlemen, but I need to get back to work."

"What are you working on?" Sloth asked.

"I'm closing out a few of these support tickets for tech issues." Sloth and Mouth watched as Ian pulled up the needed information.

"Wait--is that the number of bug reports or users currently on Wattpad right now?" Mouth asked, pointing to a number on the screen.

"Bugs," Ian mumbled.

Mouth slapped Ian on the shoulder. "Holy shitballs, man. You need to up your coding game."

Ian batted Mouth's hand off his shoulder. "Very funny."

Sloth scooted a little closer to the screen. "So what kind of issues are people having? I mean--I know my code is solid--I'm just curious."

"Let's see." Ian clicked on the first report. All three men read the screen.

[[Email Address] [email protected]]

"I like the email." Ian smiled. "Creative."

Mouth read the subject line. "There's a bug in my mature content?" He pondered the statement for a moment. "Is that what the kids call bearded clams now?" Both Ian and Sloth shrugged their shoulders while continuing to read the description portion of the form.

There was silence, an unusual phenomenon in this corner of Wattpad's Headquarters. Mouth's eyes squinted as his lips mouthed soundless words. Sloth propped his head up with his hand and read between his index and middle fingers--his mouth slightly ajar. Ian sat between the two with his arms crossed over his chest--his eyes growing and shrinking in waves.

Sloth whispered. "Train. Fucking. Wreck."

Mouth stared at the screen like a zombie. "And I can't take my eyes off the wreckage."

"Shh," Ian hissed. "I'm trying to figure out what her problem is."

"Oh," Sloth injected. "I can tell you right now this isn't anything tech support can fix."

More silence. Ian tapped his foot under his desk to shake out the discomfort and awkwardness he was feeling. There were parts in this bug report's description that unsettled him--for reasons he couldn't put a finger on.

Puckering his lips, Mouth said, "She does bring up a good point about not having more levels between mature and immature. Weird to jump from Mickey Mouse Club immediately to Mickey's Whorehouse Nightclub, don't you think?"

"Shh," Ian and Sloth hissed in unison.

More silence--three sets of eyes moving to the right across the screen, then whipping back to the left again to read another row of textual unhinged'ness.

When they got to the end of the report, Sloth rubbed his face with his palms and Ian stared lifelessly at the screen as though frozen solid.

Mouth scrunched his top lip up to his nose. "What would a Cyborg with a Swedish accent sound like?"

"I don't know," Sloth replied as he sent the bug report to the printer. "But I think the comment about tequila at the bottom was a clue."

"A clue to what?" Ian asked.

"You know those old fashioned--spy--decoder dial things?" Sloth retrieved the report from the printer and held it up. "I'm pretty sure we have to go drink some tequila if we want to understand what this means."

Mouth gave his hands a clap as he returned to his desk. "I'm in. The Funtario?"

Sloth nodded. "The only bar in town to--," he glanced at Ian, "to decode bug reports."

"Nope." Ian shook his head. "Thursdays are my designated happy hour day. I can't tonight."

Sloth rolled the report papers into a tube and hit Ian on the top of the head. "You're going," he demanded. Pointing to the report, he added, "Yoda needs your help. You can't let her down."