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[Story][Season 0] Foreign Investment
[Story][Season 0] Foreign Investment
#1
Foreign Investment - 22/Jul/2012
February 2011, Kandor City.
All alone.  In a foreign place.  A quarter billion miles to home.  She certainly wasn't walking.
Jan shivered.  She was new-born.  How could they trust her?  What if she got it all wrong.  She sat down on a crate.  Took a deep breath.  Knocked on it.  Time to get to work.
The office-workshop, with accommodation above, wasn't ideal.  But, they were in a hurry.  Things were changing in Fenspace.  If they waited another month they might have no market, or have to do a complete product re-design.  So.  Kandor.  Branch office.  Now.
Security first.  Someone smart would check-out new businesses, as they arrived.  Before they were ready.  All installed OK.  No detectable bugs in the fabric of the structure.  Jan marvelled at how her hands knew to do things.  Things this body had never learned.  But, she expected, the novelty would wear-off pretty quick.
Heavy-duty power systems, installed.  Cooling ready.  Time to unpack the FTL communicator.  Carefully touching its security locks, disabling the self-destruct.  Locking it in its new location.  Locking her AI core in place.  Yes, the self-destruct would kill her, too.  But, she was ready for that.
At last!  Everything tested OK.  The clock showed Janet'd had enough time to get back to Dublin.  Just.  Give her another fifteen minutes, just to make sure.  Put on a cup of tea.  Unpack the fridge.  Fill it from the cold box.  OK.  Enough waiting.
Success!  The FTL communicator instantly talked to Dublin, Janet's workshop.  A blur of data, and they resynchronised.  Jan/Janet now remembered both setting-up the Kandor workshop, and her flight back to Earth.  They cut the data link. Paused.  Re-connected.  Everything worked smoothly.  Jan could feel Janet doing incremental backups, so she wouldn't loose more than ten minutes, even if the whole Kandor set-up was destroyed.  Perfect.
Next, the other remotes.  J1 to 5, all unpacked, all booted first time.  She felt them like fingers on a hand, side glances of attention, all smoothly integrated.  The Hollywood Machine did good work, if they could negotiate access to it.  Her AI core was multi-processor, and that seemed to let her handle six remotes as well as Janet could handle two.  They'd learned a trick or two by studying Alice.
The Uniform Machines, sorry, "Wright Suit Synthesisers", unpacked OK.  Three to start with.  Hopefully that'd be enough.  Their anti-tamper logic was different, but just as thorough as the FTL communicator.  Next the front office. Furnishings unpacked and assembled.  The two scanning booths with their privacy arrangements.  A dozen hands made fast work.  All OK.  Jan was waiting for the other shoe to drop.  Something must go wrong!
But, all seemed ready for business.  If things went well, then maybe they'd also sell off-Earth rated "Wright Frames".  *Ding*  A potential first customer. With an almost unconscious act of will J3 went to attend.  Almost certainly just an inquiry.  Who'd buy from a business on its first day?  She hadn't even double-checked the banking details.  But still...
A good start.
--
"It is the business of the future to be dangerous" - Hawkwind
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#2
META "Foreign Investment"

Opening a shop. how could anything be more innocent? [grin]

This follows "Technology Exchange" and is followed by "Service Sector".
--
"It is the business of the future to be dangerous" - Hawkwind
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