Dar turned her head and looked at Alastair, her brows lifting.
The camera swung over and focused on the CEO. He had his arms folded over his chest, and a thoughtful expression on his face. "Well now." He mused. "I don't think we ever even thought about it that way. I recall being on our conference bridge and, naturally when I heard about the problems our people were having here, of course we sent our service personnel. It's part of who we are as a company, you know? It's the people."
"The people?"
"The people." Alastair indicated the general surroundings, and then specifically Dar and Kerry. "Our company is our people. It's not the technology and the gew-gaws and wiring. Of course we focus on taking care of the most precious resource we have, and the buses will stick around until we no longer need them. If the city benefits by that, great. I'm fine with funding as many damn cupcakes and cups of lemonade that we can pass out."
"Now," Dar cleared her throat, "will that bring us good PR? Sure. Will people remember the logo on the bus? Sure." She shrugged. "But we'd do it anyway. Our people are as glad to see those buses as anyone else is."
"Okay, cut it, John,"Avalls said. "So now let me ask you--shouldn't the city, or the government be out there doing the same thing?"
Dar sat down behind the desk. "Not my area."
Kerry chuckled.
"Not being provocative?" Sarah chuckled also. "The Red Cross is out there. There's nothing in the government really that provides that type of service. That isn't their area either."
"That's true," Kerry responded. "We have to have that facility because, like Alastair said, our people are our most important resource. We have to provide for them so they can do the jobs we need done in situations like this. It's tough to be away from your family and thrown into a relatively dangerous situation."
"Well, we could say the city workers and the military have the same issue,"Avalls commented.
"Yes, but they get paid to do public service," Kerry said. "Our people get paid to be nerds. That doesn't usually mean you put your life on the line for your job."
"And yet, here you are," Sarah said. "And from what Mr. McLean said, you were down in the disaster area in the wreckage yesterday where you could easily have been hurt, true?"
"True," Kerry agreed.
"Do they pay you for that, Ms. Stuart?" Avalls asked, folding his hands over his pad.
"No." Kerry shook her head.
"So then why go? I'm not asking to be contrary. I'm curious."
Kerry glanced past him. "Because Dar went," she answered honestly. "And I go where she goes, no matter how crazy it is."
That shut them up. They glanced between Kerry and Dar, as the cameraman fiddled with putting his gear away. "All right then," Avalls finally said. "Thanks for taking the time to talk to us. I really appreciate it."
"Anytime."Dar leaned back in her chair, as Alastair got up from the desk.
"I'll walk you folks out,"Alastair said. "Dar, the board's asked for a short recap call, can we squeeze that in next?"
"Sure," Dar agreed.
They left, closing the door and leaving Dar and Kerry alone in the office. Dar turned in her chair and regarded her partner, a wry smile on her face.
"Was that too goofy?" Kerry asked.
"Nah. Wish they'd gotten it on camera," Dar replied. "We might as well get all the good press we can now because you know we're going to get thrown under those damn buses when nothing works on Monday."
Kerry sighed. "So you haven't come up with a brilliant plan to fix the problem yet?"
Dar snorted. "Ker, thanks for the vote of confidence, but even I can't change the laws of physics." She went back to her PDA. "Hang out. You can hear the guffaws of laughter when I ask the guys over in the optics division of our network vendor if they can."
"Yerg."
"Mm."
Chapter Eleven
"HOW'S IT GOING, Mark?" Dar released the radio button and waited. She leaned back against the wall behind the desk where Kerry was seated studiously pecking at her keyboard, the tip of her tongue sticking out as she concentrated.
Dar found the expression adorable and, despite her current aggravation, it made her smile.
"Good news," Kerry said after a moment. "They got all the circuits back up at the Pentagon, Dar. That room is fully operational now." She glanced up at her companion. "What's so funny?"
Nothing." Dar cleared her throat. "That is good news. That should give you some slack on the bandwidth in that area," she added. "I know that was stressing the back haul carrying most of that on the sat."
"It does," Kerry agreed. "I'm glad, because I told some of the customers we have riding on the sat as primary we'd maybe see some improvement after the weekend." She went back to her keyboard. "Not that it kept them from bitching at me."
"Hey boss, Mark here." Dar's radio crackled."I got the router mounted down here. Had to pay to get some guy to give me power though. They freaked out when I wanted to run a cord over the ground."
"Expense it. Whatever it was," Dar responded.
"He--uh, didn't exactly give me a receipt," Mark admitted, "and I kinda had to pay in cash, if you get my drift."
Kerry turned and peered over her shoulder again. "We're not going to pass the ethics certification this year, are we?"
Dar gave her a wry look. "Expense it anyway, Mark. We'll approve it. We need to get a pull cord run down to the tunnels. Any progress on finding a path?"
There were a few clicks on the speaker before Mark answered. "They're working on it, boss. Kannan and Shaun are down there looking for a way up. Nothing yet."
Damn. Dar tapped the mic against her chin. "Okay. Keep me in the loop."
She clipped the mic and sighed. "I feel like a complete shit head making them go through this knowing it's for nothing," she said. "Just for that, I'm going to pay them all bonuses when we get back."
"Are you going to tell them?" Kerry leaned on the chair arm and studied her partner. "I guess what I mean is, what are you going to tell them once the cable gets here? Mark's going to know when he sees it,certainly Kannan will."
Dar slid down the wall to sit on the floor, extending her legs out. "I know. I don't know what I'll tell them. I'm not going to tell anyone now.Let the damn cable get here, and then--I don't know." She scratched her ear. "I'll be honest I guess. Tell them we were working on a way around it, but it didn't work out."
Kerry got up and walked over, sitting down next to Dar and stretching her legs out alongside her partner's. "This sucks, sweetie."
"It sucks." Dar's cell phone rang. She pulled it out and answered, "Dar Roberts." She listened. "Oh, hey, Chuck. Hang on." She keyed the phone's speaker. "Go ahead, Kerry's here too."
"Hey yeah, hi, Kerry." Chuck's voice echoed. "Listen, they briefed me on what you asked, Dar. I've checked with a few people. That spec won't carry the distance. It can't."
Kerry closed her eyes and pinched the bridge of her nose.
"I'm aware of that, Chuck," Dar said. "Problem is, that's all they got here. You know what's riding on it," she added. "I've been through the specifications with a fine tooth comb and I know it says it's impossible. I want to know what is possible, and whether all it's going to take is a lot of money, which I'm willing to cough up."
"Well, I know, Dar," Chuck answered. "I got fifteen senior engineers here in the white board room looking at this from every angle, but you know it is what it is. At most, they can tweak the modules to go a thousand, maybe twelve hundred meters. That's it."
Dar sighed. "Damn." She exhaled. "You were our best shot, Chuck.You've developed the latest set of optics everyone uses."
"I know,"Chuck agreed. "Not to toot our horn, but if we can't do this, nobody commercial can. We're the big dogs."