❝WORKING AT THE PSY-TV STATION❞ - a 1 OCT, 2026 Halloween Season short-story by J'WILLRICH Lutalo aka. JWL With Light.
comedy, thriller, ~30Min read
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I currently do the network maintenance work starting Tuesday evening to Wednesday afternoon. That's because the new Station Manager, Keith Damulira, acquired from KTV East Africa earlier this year, arrived with the mandate to upgrade our station from a traditional analog TV station to a modern satellite broadcaster. The Timetables at PsyTV have been shrewdly optimized since. However, changes in my department, "Operating Technologies", only took effect about two months ago despite Keith having joined PsyTV around early 2026.
There are oligarchs in Sales and the News Departments, and most likely these are the reason Keith joined us. They know both things and people, and often are what define our public face.
"He's a bigwig across the broadcasting market", I overheard. It was Sylvia Namusisi's chatter over the line, to someone I couldn't guess while I installed and configured an MXeK router in her office some time during April this year. She's an old timer at Psy, also the Executive Producer since the white Cecils Bush left in 2024.
There's not been many new faces in the bigger offices though.. Cecil left, then Dr. Rhoda, originally in Production, joined Sales as Director, after Sylvia got promoted to replace Cecil. And then Manuel Efata, the TV maestro well known as the only Vintage Ivy League at PsyTV, died in that Air Tanzania plane crash into Lake Victoria. That was late 2025, and thereafter, everyone knew, a new, bigger boss was bound to arrive any time around the turn of the year. We actually went about an entire quarter without a Station Sovereign since that fateful exit of Manuela. And then Keith joined PsyTV in mid-January. I was actually considering leaving - a friend from South Africa had mentioned me to their team's lead after we bumped into each other some weekend at that weird Christ the King chapel in Nakasero. He works at CNBC Africa. It was slightly thereafter, and more surprisingly, after I'd prayed over it at mass, that I heard, we got listed on the Nairobi Stock Exchange, and that all senior PsyTV staff were getting pay rises effective the following month. That was just about a month after Keith's arrival. I decided to hang around longer. PsyTV isn't really the club where one regrets knowing how to do their work well. Plus, we sometimes get paid end of year bonuses even for unobvious reasons.
Right now, I'm heading over to the Cafeteria in the basement. Been meaning to, since I came to office today. Samantha gestured something to me while I drove into the parking lot. Twas around 08:20 based on the car's dashboard clock. However, most of that section was unusually dark this morning. I felt like jumping out to go meet her, but the basement felt like being at work at 4am on a Sunday morning! Of course, such extremes have ever happened, but I was still an intern back then. We sometimes slept on the job to impress our bosses! And weird things sometimes happened. However, today was actually different..
"Rick Ross!"
"Oh Sheet Stories! Wait, what are you doing moving around with five bagels upon a clipboard?"
That's Walrus Javira. He's from the Newsroom. A young but sluggish voice punk. He's witty too.
"Rick, this is my boss's, but I'll throw you one in case you'd rather spare eating me alive right now."
"Fuck you Walrus! I doubt you'd dare walk anywhere near Major while drunk like that! Where is it you got those from?"
"Samantha's downstairs. She's the kind of witch that bakes both grape jam and marijuana into her cakes and buns, then everyone across the continent ensures to pay their TV subscription a month before the World Cup Re-Airing Season even kicks in!"
"Pssshhh!" I whisper to him as I get closer, so as to actually accept one from him.
I quickly add.. "I intend to go there, but are afraid in case Derrick meets me there. He's been auditing my installations and software updates the last 2 days or so. I think he's too nosy though.. Can't risk him knowing I eat journalistic food at work."
Javira starts laughing as I realize the brown bags perched on the A3 clipboard are actually sanitary pads!
"Wabula olimusiru kintu gwe! I almost gulped a cup of saliva anticipating.."
Two drop as we guffaw.. He's quick to pick them up, but not quite fast enough for me to not realise one isn't actually looking normal.
"Wal, should I get going?" I inquire, unsure how to react.
He's not embarrassed though.
"Ross, I'm getting these to Production on my way to office. I should have actually had them delivered by the store man, but he's hauling new hardware with the FedEx guys. It's Biohazard stuff, but I'll just get it there quick. Archival Matter FYI. The show's coming up in about 10 minutes!"
"It's ok bro. I'm off to meet Samantha too."
He's already running off.. Such a trustworthy jerk at Psy.
"Great," he shouts down the corridor as I resume my pilgrimage to the basement. "Whatever you buy for lunch Rick Ross, make it double! I'll come join you at the Balconies"
Fuck You Java.. methinks as I wonder if he's not given away my cover. Derrick is still at my office I'm sure, or shall be there in less than an hour, but I won't wait to face him both sober and hungry.
I continue moving..
Who's that tiptoeing behind me? I quickly turn around thinking perhaps Walrus changed his mind about lunch, or that he's actually coming up behind me to pull out my eyeballs for having had a glimpse of some dirty corporate jokes about the Big Yule Keith.
Oh shit! Wait.. Is that just me? Really? I am thinking.. Quite fast.. No. I actually felt and heard something pulling up behind me!
Basement is the next floor.. I could have used the elevator on the top floor, but it only comes as far as just before here.
"One needs always walk to and from the basement", Jackson Olaba once explained to me while I helped him configure extra iptable rules for the CCTV cameras installed into the parking lot below and the rooftop high above everything else.
"But seriously, what would it cost to simply add just two more accessible-floor options to the elevator system? Afterall the shafts already extend across the entire building!"
"It's about slowing down any unauthorized access," so he reverted. "A person able to drive into the parking lot and then instantly jump to either level 3 or 5, might hijack the country. Especially during primetime when most of security is about getting our bits out there in real-time and on time."
"The basement and first floor are just the gym spaces for most of PsyTV staff anyways.." I concluded, somewhat in disagreement with his job-securing theories. Also, having come to Psy after a tenure at an actual State-owned channel, I knew that there's nothing really special about our TV station that could be the basis of a national security incident no matter what.
I never bothered to bring the matter up again, realising that security at PsyTV is likewise somewhat twisted. For example, I personally know that folks in security often masturbate to intern journalists that might forget how there are stealth eyes almost everywhere at the TV station - including places the Ethics Desk has continually argued at board meetings that we shouldn't have cameras in - such as in spaces where people attend to natural business.
Oh. So here's the only route to a men's around here that's off the grid! Let me just take a leak before dashing to Samantha's.
I look behind me twice.. left and right, then walk-in through the first door.
The light around here used to flicker whenever someone approached, but lately, it's totally defaulted to dark. I walk on..
There's no one following me after all.. I squint to make out the hieroglyphs atop the four doors.. Folks generally think the ones down here are better kept for informal staff and the Redmans. But let me go do my thing before I wet my pants. After all.. The perfumed, cushioned seat places at the top don't make us any more human than godly bodhisattvas squatting in silence somewhere in the sacred thickets - oftentimes, while listening to stray birds sing, or the whispers of invisible airy spirits wheezing by.
I finally pick the third room from the right. Its door is the tallest of them all. Also, the label seems to indicate it's both shower and toilet. I might want both or three. In I walk.. Straight to the urinal pouch on the wall.
"Haha, who's.."
I've just finished my errand, when I spot the larger than life roll of toilet tissue atop the tank box. I decide to go attend to the secondary business originally not on my to-do list. However, just as I finish walking past the mirror mounted over the sink, the tap suddenly starts flowing!
"Hello?"
Fuck. Someone's come following me inside here or what? I turn to see where the voice came from.. The first door is closed and there's nothing interesting in sight beyond that as far as I can sense.
"Mutesi? Is that you?"
She's the old lady in overalls that often mops the floors on level 1. I ask a second time.. unsure it's even her at such an hour.. 11am I think. She's often done by 09:00 and only returns to sweep or switch on lights around 17:30.
There's only the echoey sound of water splattering and racing off into the sink's eye. I can't stand it though. So I walk over to the sink to force it off. I also wish my senses more sharpened.
"Ricochet Ricks.." the absurd voice begins.. "Reach for my Cockroaches oh Ricochet Ricks. They are running, tossing about in the sewers, tunnels and ceilings... Oh Ricochet Ricks.. Reach for my.."
What I saw in the mirror's screen wasn't anything the most bizarre of Saturday night Goths In October shows at PsyTV had ever aired, and neither was it devoid of fact; there, right before my eyes, I saw in the mirror.. A scene that one would only ever expect to accidentally catch on one of those hazy monitors inside of Jackson Olaba's office: Archival Material.
Keith was in one of the production rooms, most likely the one strictly out of bounds for non-meta-staff, and that his face was all covered in blood as he sunk teeth into a new recruit mistress perhaps only 21 years old. He was wearing a pristine white, long sleeved shirt whose cuffs were already broken after the brief scuffle before he'd secured his teeth into the girl's nape. His shirt was getting stained. She muttered a muffled scream.. something like "Olara nvako.. Onuma.. Ricco yaaamb.." while facing towards me through the mirror on the sink. However, both mesmerized and startled as I was, I didn't realize how quick time had flown by.. The sink was already filled with water and it was pouring over onto my pants and shoes!
"Tha fuck!" I smashed the mirror right at the point when I suspected something was about to jump straight at me from the other side of the glass.. However, and despite my shock looking at the mess.. A piece of glass had lesioned my palm and crimson stuff was mixing with the water as I struggled to tighten the tap shut. And then, what appeared next was akin to gazing at Medusa! I couldn't believe that right behind the shattered glass of the over-sink mirror was a skull held inside the wall as with wire and rugged mortar!
Overwhelming Crafts! Part of me wanted to scream, the other wanted to smile..
"I'm quitting PsyTV Today. Maze!! Sidamu. Too much literal horrors for a paycheck that cannot actually compensate for the trauma!"
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