That's right.  The place you trudge to every morning from the bus stop you can't pronounce is a recreated Terracotta army site.  Essentially, you are a player in a 21st Century version of Qin Shi Huang’s afterlife.

The Splice is going to kindly give you a virtual tour.  Right now:

The infantrymen are lightly armoured, wielding basic weapons they had to source themselves.  They are the ones forced to duke it out on the Front Line.     

The Officers (pictured) are way behind, endlessly locked in clandestine discussion, their hands empty and shaped in what could only be described as a masturbatory position.  Many of these people do not even have heads, and are essentially hollow inside.

The Archers who skulk between are there to report on any out of order behaviour from the Front Lines.  Jesters and acrobats are along for the ride.  A significant amount of the soldiers are still buried (in shit) with no immediate plans to be unearthed, even though their existence is well known.

The Emperor himself meanwhile is 1.5 kilometres away within a mountain of jade and gold.  There are no immediately obvious open lines of communication.   Regardless, his army are ordered to face the other direction, and must defend him without question. 

But woe betide he who goes anywhere near the precious fucker. 

Without warning, Agents dressed like French IT workers panicked a busload of commuters this week by jumping up and demanding proof of fare.  The driver noted, “Most passengers scooted to the middle doors like they always get out at the Josy Barthel Stadium.”

“Attempts to prize them open resulted in six people falling into a kind of human ball making it impossible for the next wave to even try.”

A Brit, Tom Grageingwell told the Splice “My effort to filibuster them by playing the language game lasted about 0.7 seconds.  Even showing my M-Kaart which expired in 2013 didn’t placate them in the slightest.   Why did I bother getting that special plastic wallet for it then?"  

"At least I didn't go for the doors, those people got beaten with sticks."

The Agents held their own throughout, facing such gems as; “This is illegal in my country!”  “You wouldn’t act like this in first class!” and “Fuck you, I won’t do what you tell me!”

Concerned by these scare tactics, the Splice was mortified to learn of the following plans the Luxembourg government has:

• Staff of Cactus, Auchan and Delhaize will check to see if customers are sneakily also shopping at Aldi and Lidl.  Those shopping in neighbouring countries will have their Luxembourg residency stripped, and may even experience an ‘accident’ on the way home.
• Anyone openly complaining about the slow progress of the trams will be thrown into that underground train station at the airport until they can figure out what to do with it.

You’ve been warned dinguses.    

You thought the seldom seen presence by the office window was a Temp or an IT Consultant.  Your Teammates weren’t sure if what they’d seen teleporting around the floor space was man or ghost. 

Your Line Manager resigned to thinking it was the lunch delivery guy taking a seat while his payment was collected.  One colleague interviewed thinks it's just a glitch in the Matrix.

These are all way off the mark.  Truth is, the desk in question is occupied.  By a human being who’s been working with you for years.

His name is Matthew, and by using a combination of CCTV, motion detectors and a cheque-repas tied to a piece of string, the Splice has observed this mystical figure and his movements.*

He comes in early, and each day wanders between coffee machines, meeting rooms, other Teams, windows, toilets and the Lunch guy in varying patterns.  Some days it’s a pentagram, others a figure of eight.  On one New Years Eve, he perfectly mapped out all known constellations, all before logging out and boarding his train home by 16:30!

*The cheque-repas yielded the best results.

Native English speakers who make sure to perfect their French but are at the same time utterly disdainful of any other language or culture are edging further into obscurity, the Splice is proud to inform.  The vehicle being used to justify this outright narcissism is running out of gas baby.

In an oh-so-slowly internationally growing Grand Duchy, the relevance of the holier-than-thou toff is waning*.

Bilingual android Ben proffered, “I ride First Class on the Eurostar and TGV not to just get away from the scum but to also give more gravity to the complaints I make afterwards.  Common sense isn’t it?” 

Ben isn't pictured above because he's even more of a prick than that guy.

When prompted about Luxembourg's other neighbours he spewed “Belgium is a transit country as far as I'm concerned and if I find myself in Germany I talk French, then sigh and inconveniently switch to English.”

As he strode off he huffed, “Don’t even get me started on those disgusting Brazilians who clean my office.”

The Splice says good riddance to Ben and his ilk, here’s hoping you sail away down a drain where that clown from ‘IT’ hangs out. 

*There is one plus side to these vain dandies, the Splice is grateful that they use the term ‘railway station’ instead of ‘gare’ in the rare moments they do decide to speak English.