Clearing his throat uncomfortably, Felix felt excited.
“Let’s go see the new building first, Headquarters,” he said.
Kit nodded her head and got the car going. They sped off quickly down the road.
“So… are you going to do what you said?” Eva asked. She reached up and tucked a dark brown lock of hair around an ear.
“What, about the new pawnshop? Yep. I also want to explore what we did with the Telemedics. I think that could be something we can use to train people up a whole heck of a lot faster. I’ve already got some things to test out.
“The hard part is getting in the door, then getting them to buy the pitch,” Felix admitted with a frown. “It’s like any job, right? You get interviewed as you interview them. They find out if they want to work for you, work for the company, and if it’ll do right by them.”
“That seems hard,” Eva said.
“It can be. Especially if the number of jobs outpaces the workforce. Then you end up in salary wars, one hiring away the employees of the other and constantly raising their rates. We’ll see though. I think we’ll be able to make enticing offers. Well, provided that new indentured servant contract Lily drew up is valid and legal,” Felix said seriously. “I mean, this whole trip will be pointless if the contract doesn’t bind them to me in the same way.”
“Speaking of,” Kit said from the front seat. “Are we technically no longer slaves?”
Frowning at the question, Felix called up his point screen.
Received
Spent
Remaining
Daily Allotment
150
0
150
Miu Miki
1,250
1,250
0
—Direct reports
14,315
0
14,315
Ioana Iliescu
1,100
0
1,100
—Direct reports
25,170
0
25,170
Kit Carrington
2,250
2,250
0
—Direct reports
22,170
0
22,170
Lilian Lux
2,600
2,600
0
—Direct reports
14,750
0
14,750
Andrea Elex
1,500
3,000
-1,500
Felicia Fay
1,600
4,800
-3,200
—Direct reports
14,125
0
1,600
Eva Adelpha
4,900
4,900
0
Mr. White.
300
900
-600
—Direct reports
21,090
0
21,090
+ Loyalty Bonus
5,030
0
5,030
DAILY TOTAL
132,300
19,700
100,075
“Everything is still there. So your contract works. That or you’re still a slave. Won’t know until we test the new contract on someone else,” Felix said.
After a while the vehicle came to a slow stop as Felix tinkered with his screen. He’d spent any number of hours fiddling with his views. Trying to get the most out of them.
It was beginning to seem more like an anxiety response.
At least the huge increase in points from all the unpowered they bought certainly had paid off. Though their costs in finances was still annoying. Their profit margin shrunk by a few percentage points.
He had to constantly spend points to keep a thousand and one things on track and moving in the right direction. The point calendar looked like an ever-increasing bank balance that always had more withdrawals than he liked.
How else were we going to bring everyone back to life, though? We needed those people.
Not like you can magic up points. Gold? Sure. Points? Not really. And converting one to the other is damned expensive.
Victoria opened the door and stepped out, Miu doing the same.
“No hostile thoughts,” Kit said, holding a hand to her ear.
There was a muted response from the earpiece.
Felix waited quietly as he promised he would.
“Holy cow, that’s the new building?” Eva asked, peering out the passenger window from her side of the car.
Looking up, Felix found himself staring at a rather large skyscraper.
Tall, dark, and ominous, it was a rectangle. There were no accents or artful designs.
A giant rectangle stabbing into the sky.
Felix kinda liked the simplicity of it.
It went up what he’d guess was fifty floors.
Looking back down he found the entry was a vast and open area that funneled down into one single entry. The rest of the building on the ground floor was made of concrete.
He could definitely see why Miu, Andrea, Victoria, and Ioana were all happy with the building.
The entry was a death trap. A real choke point without even being reinforced or upgraded.
Makes sense.
“Where’s… where are we living?” Eva asked softly.
“I’ll be modifying it to be an exact replica of our current HQ in Skippercity. At least, everything from the ground floor down. You’ll be living in the exact same room you do at home, I suppose,” Felix said.
Going to be most of your points for the day there, Felix old pal. You won’t be doing much after this at all.
In fact, it would be all of his points. One hundred thousand and five hundred points. And that’d only take care of the first floor and down.
It’d take another several days to get the upper floors into what they wanted.
Kit and Lily had run the numbers on how much it would cost. In the end, using Felix’s points and several days of his time was simply the cheapest method. Even if all he did was make gold all day instead.
“Oh. Where’s your office going to be? Top floor?” Eva asked.
“Pfft. Only a villain, a hero, or a fool would live that high up. Nope, I’ll be in my office below ground. If I can’t be there, then I’ll be on the second floor when I have to be. With a window I can bust open and a comfy bush below it I can jump into,” Felix said dismissively. “Top floor will be a dummy office that I ‘work out of’ but it’ll really just be an elevator going really slow for one floor. Mr. White put together this weird display for the windows to mimic the top floor. It’s too technical for me, but it works.”
“That seems overly elaborate,” Eva said.
“It is. But it made them happy to solve a problem I didn’t care about. So we let them solve it. He’ll be here in a few days anyways so he can explain it then if you want.”
Victoria came up and rapped on the glass twice, waited five seconds, then opened the door.
Sighing, Felix slid out of the car and stood up with a stretch.
All around him, spreading out across the entire entry area, were people in tactical gear. They carried loaded and locked weapons, all checked out, licensed, and legal.
It was as if a private military company had been contracted for security detail.
Well, after the training Andrea gave them, maybe they are a PMC.
Thinking about what he wanted done to the building, he watched as the window floated up from nothing in front of him.
Then he thumbed the accept button.
“Let’s go settle in then. Today is moving day, and I imagine there’ll be a number of trucks showing up soon. Probably need to have you and your HR team ready to scan the locals as they help out,” Felix said, turning his head to Kit.
Sighing, she nodded her head and gave him a small smile.
“You’re right of course. I’ll get my people moving,” she said.
“Good. I’ll be in my office going over our quarter to date results,” Felix said eagerly.
Spreadsheets were still what made sense to him.