'I figured that after yesterday, I'd come and visit your office. I've got my office diverting everything to wherever I am, so we can stay here or move about as you need,' said Grum. It was a gesture of conciliation as well as probably more efficient for this particular meeting.
'Cool. I think I'd got as far as telling you about the raft of Nevada generator requests I've had in.'
Grum nodded acknowledgement of the reminder. 'Break it down for me. Give me the details. Then, we need to talk about splitting up the running of the Division.'
Stew's grin told Grum that he was on board. 'I also have an update on the new build designs for the second and third production assemblies to feed into the current decelerator assembly. It's going to take some work on scheduling.'
Grum nodded. 'OK. Gimme.'
Chapter 2
THE weddings were never going to be small family affairs and given their new positions — and attendant wage increases — there was no need to keep things quiet. It was to be a civil ceremony, but that did not mean it had to lack ostentation.
All four families had to be flown in and put up in hotels. None of the families had ever been wealthy, so the two couples willingly bore the brunt of the costs.
When Kelvin Goldstein got wind of the weddings he sent Grum a pointed reminder that his invitation had got lost in the post. At the same time he offered the services of his Golf Club and Hotel for the event. Grum had been somewhat wary of accepting the offer, not knowing what to expect of the place. So he and Stew had spent the journey to visit the club working out methods of demurral that would not cost them their jobs.
They need not have worried, however, the club, hotel and grounds were lavishly appointed and beautifully kept. Vann and Amy, agreed to the offer once they saw the pictures.
The day itself went without a hitch. The only thing that they were less than perfectly happy with was the presence of the press. Kelvin Goldstein's attendance had brought queries from him about other notables they might wish to invite. This inevitably had expanded — to the confused irritation of all four — to include a few of the bright and beautiful. Where they went, so went the press.
The main players suffered in silence, however. Mostly managing to enjoy the day, by avoiding anyone they did not recognise.
The following day, the parents had formed a gang and gone on a mission to find every possible newspaper and magazine to hunt for stories and pictures. Grum only found relief from his dad's continuous text updates when they boarded the plane destined for Tanzania and the secluded resort that Amy had arranged for them all.
None of the four were the adventurous type. Amy was perhaps more so than the other three, but being in the third trimester had made her more than willing to relax rather than thrill-seek. So the majority of the days were spent in combinations of beach-combing, pool-dipping, eating at as many restaurants as they could find, and generally chilling out.
They were all back in the US after a little under a month of honeymooning. In Amy's case it was only a few weeks before her due date, so she chose to immediately start her maternity leave rather than go back to work for only a couple of weeks. The move to New York for both families had been completed while they were away. Although they had paid for an unpacking service, nothing was quite in the right place. Making the new apartments into homes would take a while.
No sooner was Grum back in the office than he had a meeting invite pop up in his calendar from Kelvin Goldstein.
Grum had been a little nervous about taking so long a holiday so soon after the new appointment and with so much up in the air, even though Kelvin had assured him that he considered it perfectly appropriate. Perhaps now he would find out what Kelvin really thought about it.
Grum went along to the CEO's office and was waved through immediately by an assistant from the outer office to the inner.
'Good morning, Kelvin,' said Grum with a affability he did not truly feel so early in the day.
'I certainly hope so! Well rested?'
'Mostly, yes, thank you.'
'Good. I'll get straight to the point. I know that you have a lot on your plate right now, but it is said that if you want something done, give it to someone who is already busy.'
Grum had heard the phrase before and it smacked of the sort of poor delegation technique he had been guilty of before the wedding. He decided that it would be counter-productive to point this out, though. 'What can I do for you, Kelvin?'
'As with everything, this is for the benefit of the company. In addition to the Vice-Presidency of the New Energy Division, I would like you to devise and head up a new department which will watch for possible inter-dependency of projects and/or departments with a view to enabling all the Divisions to their maximum potential. This new position will enable you to carry on with your re-design plan for the antimatter programme and more importantly, expand that horizon to encompass the entire company!' Kelvin Goldstein was standing, gesticulating and all but frothing at the mouth. Bright-eyed, he turned to Grum with his hand out expectantly, echoing their first meeting.
He certainly doesn't lack for enthusiasm, thought Grum, but he grasped Kelvin's hand anyway. 'Sounds like a challenge, I accept. While I remember, Kelvin, I was thinking of dropping "new" from the Division name.'
Kelvin release Grum's hand and waved his own with a modicum of impatience. 'Completely your affair, in my eyes. Do as you will. But once again, go gather your inner circle!'
'I will. Immediately!' Exchanging a gesture somewhere between a salute and a wave with Kelvin, Grum left the office and headed back to his own. Oh, that's just bloody brilliant, that is.
Grum spent the remainder of the morning sorting through his inbox. He wanted to call Stew in to discuss this new department idea, but he knew that Stew would be doing the same inbox duty and would not welcome distraction, even though the job was onerous.
One particular email stood out from the rest. It was from Ben Abelson at Nevada. He was asking whether Grum had given thought to expanding the medical facilities at the site. His reasoning was that with more staff on site as well as the increase in purely industrial engineering going on — although much of that was fully automated — there was an increased risk of injury.
Grum agreed. A proper emergency facility would be in order in addition to the general practice. He responded to Ben's email saying as much, and marked any others from Ben to assess both tone and content. It seemed to Grum that Ben might be gravitating to the leadership role. No bad thing, given the focus of the site, now, was engineering and Ben was certainly experienced in that arena.
Grum's next job was to follow up on the start he and Stew had made in educating the various Divisions about the availability and specifications of the antimatter generators.
Stew had been right in his assessment of the idea that the Division VPs had of the potential for AM power generation. They were all thinking about miniature nuclear power plant levels of energy output from an office sized installation. Conversely they were all also thinking about tiny generators which could last a thousand years. And they thought it was cheap.
If the old VP had not disappeared off the face of the planet as far as USSMC was concerned, Grum could cheerfully have throttled him.
He was having some influence, but he was making precious few friends in the process. Nevertheless, he gave them all the top-line specs for the Tech Centre installation, including power output, longevity, and cost per kilowatt-hour. In return, he received a lengthy wishlist from each VP and gave a promise to look into each item regarding viability.
On that score his greatest success was with the VP of the Space Division. There was a programme on the list where the current generators — or the new pods — would be viable.
The cost of this programme was so vast already that adding a billion or two dollars to it was no great shakes. Emergency power for the various types of station and orbital they had planned, seemed to suit the output range of the existing generators. The specifics could be worked out, b
ut viability was highly likely.
That discovery sent Grum into lunchtime with a smile.
The staff restaurant at the Tech Centre was a nice place to have a quick meal or a casual meeting. All the meat available was farmless: vat-grown and expensive. Everything else was sourced as locally as possible, as fresh as possible. The bar remained closed during the day time, but opened for a couple of hours at the end of the working day.
Stew was already there when Grum arrived, apparently just starting his lunch. Grum gestured that he would grab something and join him, to which Stew gave an answering thumbs-up.
'Good day, so far?' asked Grum as he sat down with his chicken ciabatta and fries.
'About as expected. I saw you had a meeting with Kelvin Goldstein this morning.'
'Yep. He's got yet another job for us.'
'You're kidding? What now?'
'Kelvin wants us to form a small department specifically to look at interoperability and interdependency between projects and departments. Given how he's reacted to our actions of the last two and a bit years I suspect that he actually wants us to go a bit further than that, we'll see.'
'When by?'
'No guidance on that, but the assumption always is sooner rather than later when you get requests from the CEO.'
'True enough.' Stew took a bite of his lunch and chewed thoughtfully.
Grum saw that they had gone for the same meal and smiled, starting on his own lunch.
'I don't think I can take anything else on, right now,' said Stew when he had finished his mouthful. 'Amy's about due and I'm about to start paternity leave.'
Grum swallowed. 'Yeah. I think that we get the current business under control first. You can focus on that until you go on paternity. I'll work on getting information out of the VPs about what they are doing. Oh, a little bit of success there. Space actually has a viable project for Nevada pods.'
'Cool. Gimme the specs and I'll get them down to Ben. About Ben, by the way…'
'Yes, he is, isn't he,' Grum interrupted. 'I'll have a talk with him. Got to open the position up for interview, of course, but he's the strongest candidate.'
Chapter 3
STEW and Amy's son, Clait, was born in the early hours of 31st July. The very next day Grum visited Nevada for a series of interviews and meetings, the results of which would finalise the new structure and appointments at both Nevada business units.
Stew's paternity leave came to a finish a fortnight later and he took over the as-yet-unnamed new department within the New Energy Division. Grum had rejected outright Stew's suggestion that he call it the Department of Connections, although he admitted it was pertinent.
They decided that the best way to introduce people to the new department and to its head was to invite all the veeps, and as many AVPs as was reasonable, to a presentation followed by a launch party.
But first they needed a name.
'What about something with "synergy"?'
Grum shrugged in answer. 'Possibly "syncretise", it's closer to what we're trying to do,' Grum offered and got a shrug from Stew in return.
'What exactly are we trying to do with it?' asked Stew of the room.
'Pan-Divisional syncretisation. Kinda.'
Stew blinked. 'Pandsy? No.'
'No.' Grum agreed with a shake of his head.
'Department for Inter-Divisional Syncretisation.'
'Functional, bit of a mouthful, but it's got a pronounceable acronym. Trouble is that the first time we fail to deliver exactly what is demanded "DIDS" will become "DIDn'tS".'
'Wasn't thinking of using the acronym, anyway, boss. We can do an Anne McCaffrey on it.'
'SyncDep?'
'Yep.'
'Don't see why not.' Grum frowned.
'Wassup? I think the name'll be OK, so long as it doesn't become Sync-Without-A-Trace-Dep.'
Grum smiled a little at that, but he had something else on his mind.
'SyncDep, since I agree on the name, doesn't belong in my Division.'
'I know.' Stew settled down, his mood starting to match Grum's. 'We're the right people, though.'
'Oh, yeah. Doubtless. But still… It really belongs in Core Business along with Compliance, Legal, et cetera.'
'I suppose so. I don't think I'm ready to do a tour in Core Business, just yet,' Stew shuddered.
Grum grinned at his friend. 'I wouldn't worry about that, for now. See, I think it's deliberate.'
Stew raised an eyebrow quizzically, but remained schtum.
'Originally, I thought it might be a blunder by our great and glorious Kelvin, but that didn't quite track,' said Grum while Stew contented himself with expressive eyebrow work. 'Why would our CEO see the need for SyncDep and yet miss its obvious place in the corporate structure? Answer: he wouldn't. Must be another reason. I reckon that if SyncDep were in its natural habitat in USSMC Core, the other Divisions would have no choice but to heed its directives, and probably resent it every dragging step of the way. By sticking it under New Energy we have to sell the ideas, the other Divisions have to want and accept the integration methods, and we have to demonstrate results with those who take us up in order to bring the others on board. Once it's become a ubiquitous concept Kelvin'll either disband the department or roll it into Core somewhere.'
'I can see that. So what sort of things have you found during my time on paternity?'
'Let's get to that in a second. While we're talking names, I have approval to change the Division's name. New Energy does not cut it.'
'OK. We could just drop the "new".'
'Thought about that, but it sounds pants. Energy Division. It sounds like we sap enthusiasm, and given how much bad news I've had to deliver to the various veeps over the last few weeks about powering their pet projects, it could stick.'
'Something with "power" in it, rather than energy?'
'That could work. What were you thinking?'
'Power Core? Power Distribution Centre?' Stew rattled off names, but Grum just kept shaking his head. 'What about flipping it around, like, Core Power?'
'To be honest, I quite like that. And it gives the nod to what we were just talking about.'
'We probably don't have to worry about anyone this side of the pond coming up with something like "Cor! Power?", do we?'
'I doubt it. OK. That'll do for naming things. We can do a dual naming and unveiling party, then.
'Makes sense. Now, about the party…' Stew turned to where they had left the presentation plans, before they had gone on to names.
The party had definitely been a networking success, for Stew in particular.
The change of name from New Energy to Core Power was greeted with the normal polite applause from most, and faux-enthusiasm from the marketing department — with the notable exception of Steve Branch who kept to the applause, breaking his cover of polite attention only once to deliver a sly wink to Grum. Stew's appointment as AVP in charge of SyncDep, however, generated genuine interest. Especially when Stew promised all those there present that they would be getting individual attention and bespoke treatment directly from himself, to ensure that their needs were catered for – to the best of his ability to arrange – by the best source.
Kelvin Goldstein was on his feet and applauding wildly before the sound of Stew's last words had died away, and everyone followed suit.
'I have a full diary for the next week,' said Stew as he came over to Grum when the press of other AVPs slackened.
'What berk put you in charge?'
'You did. Seems to be working, too.'
'How so?'
'I'm hearing about a lot of wishlist stuff, as normal, but there are one or two things which might be viable. I kept tomorrow morning clear — to the annoyance of many. I blamed you.'
Grum laughed. 'Fair enough. I'm going to head off and say goodnight to Ju. See you in the morning.'
'I won't be much longer, either. I've spoken with just about everyone. Tomorrow, then.'
The following morning, they wer
e sat in Grum's office sharing companionable mugs of coffee.
'You said about some viable projects?' Grum prompted as the small talk waned.
'Yes. Might help with sweetening the Nevada new build pill.'
'Real viable projects?'
'Ones the might just translate into fillable orders, in fact.'
'Ah, justifiable expenditure.' Grum smiled.
'But the single collider output at Nevada won't cope,' said Stew.
'I take it you've worked out how much production capacity we'd need?' Stew nodded, hesitantly. 'Show me the numbers.'
Stew obliged. His summaries, calculations, assumptions and preliminary design notes sprang into life on the wall and the office obediently darkened.
'Without any modification, the Nevada collection rig can be augmented by an upgrade of the production assembly to produce twice the mass of our old design. With minor adjustments it could also produce half-size masses, no problem. Trouble is that we'd need to design new containment chambers and the generator facility is not set up to handle smaller chambers in its current factory…' Stew started, but Grum jumped in.
'Let's see if I can follow the chain of reasoning from there: new factory units to handle the new chambers, but we still only have two or three sizes of AM generator at the end. I know there's been interest from other parties, and we can't let production on the main generators slack either at the AM production stage or the power-plant manufacturing stage. So, we need, er, two new colliders designed to produce antimatter from the centigram scale down to the picogram orders of magnitude?' Stew nodded, and Grum continued his speculations. 'To make use of that we'd have to build out the generator plant so that it could make several sizes. Since the collector points would have to be moved anyway, say three stations sited where the colliders are proximal? That way two colliders could be serviced from any one station. We could use the entire old complex and build out from there for the generator factories.'
Leaving Earth Vol. 1 (Leaving Earth Omnibus) Page 12