Soon I saw daddy turning to look directly at me - only to motion to his right side (brother being already hard at work on his left) indicating for me to sit down. Considering I had no need nor will to reject, I indeed sat down, finding those leather seats to be quite comfortable.
“Since you’ll be learning about our family business, I’ll need you to quickly learn your way around a holopad, so I prepared this one for you.” So saying as if every child wouldn’t murder their parents in order to get the newest & flashiest gadget there was on the market.
Reaching into his inner pocket he pulled out a pen shaped device - which was very similar to his own if not for the very girlish bubblegum pink colour scheme.
There was no second guessing from him as he moved over for me to accept; which I of course did with a bright smile. He wasn’t finished there as he then reached below his feet after opening up a compartment by tapping on it with his heel. “I’m happy you were taking your marksmanship practice properly and I hope you take my advice on board from now on as you keep up. Although you’ll also need to practise reloading.”
Out from under his seat he pulled out a wooden box - which had our company's gun divisions logo on top of it. He didn’t say any more as he placed the box in the area between where I & he sat. Thus leaving it up to me when to spy into the contents.
There was no need to hesitate (nor wait) so I popped the pink holopad into my jacket’s pocket then reached out to crack the box open. Sure enough, it was lined with countless bullets that seemed perfect to be used with my [Baby’s Erste Schusswaffe], even if they weren’t the type to produce a trail.
“I expect you to at least practise one cylinders worth every day and you can use the company's firing ranges whenever we’re out on business.” He ordered with the same sombre face as always - I had no reason to to disagree either since I had planned to do that in order to maximise my experience gains anyway.
I was certainly interested in seeing what would belong to me in the near future - so I couldn’t help looking at him once more. “When will we head off to work?”
“So, you can speak properly when you're excited about something, huh?” A smirk forming on daddy’s lips as he moved a finger forward to poke right between my gleaming eyes. Still, he answered my question despite his teasing words. “We’ve already headed off.”
“Our hover cars are the most well received from both the highest and lowest in society, from all around the world, so it only makes sense for us to take full advantage of it.” Hearing brother’s voice proudly profess our multinational virtue - I turned to look toward him - only to see him closing his laptop with a quiet yet satisfying *clack* to show how much effort we put into our designs.
Brother’s eyes practically glowed - like the child he was - as he crossed his arm over his chest at the same time as puffing his chest out before continuing to proclaim. “Our Porshi corporation oversees a lot of different areas of business; our motto for all of them is to never settle for ‘just good enough’!”
From the side daddy just closed his eyes, while nodding softly to Arthur’s words, so I could only nod as well as I checked out those bullets.
I couldn’t help agree that these things indeed were quality products (without so much as a blemish upon their surface) which was certainly important considering their purpose. Although they weren’t anything fancy like father’s bullets - I had nothing to complain about from my inexperienced point of view.
My right hand slid down to my hip to remove [Baby’s Erste Schusswaffe] in addition to pressing the cylinder eject - having it open with a crisp *cachunk* - letting the shells fall into an empty cup. Slowly I moved my left hand over. Putting bullet after bullet into their place. Though, I was glad I at least hadn’t pressed the release trigger while fanning the hammer.
With a satisfying *click* I flicked the revolver to the side to have the cylinder fall back into place with the six new bullets. I still had some of the practice bullets from my father - yet I feel it would be better to look into how they work rather than waste them when I’d get the same experience for a cheaper option.
Time to dive into getting to terms with my new position as a genius heir of a conglomerate.
Sure enough - when I looked through my new holopad - it was filled with a lot of information on the structure of Porshi. The information focusing specifically on the more military focused subsidiary called ‘Furstin’. A lot of it was just important people that I would need to take note of, what they were doing, current public projects as well as other details that would be considered open enough secrets that it wouldn’t matter if it were leaked.
There was certainly a lot, however, if one considers the highest geniuses throughout history were seven at most in terms of intelligence… Well my ten points of intelligence made my memory quite good.
Suddenly a *buzz* came from the speakers around the limousine's interior - as our chauffeur's voice echoed through the cabin. “We have just arrived at the branch.” How have we arrived so quickly yet stably to the extent I didn’t even realise; this is far beyond the league of even those from Vagen even 23 years into the future that I had ridden on as a slave servicing a renowned master.
Soon after the door opened up with just as much grace and discreteness as everything else our company seemed to produce. “Bet you’re surprised with how fast we got here; well it’s not that surprising since we used the holo-way plus this limousine was made to be used for business men hence we’ve done everything possible to make one unable to even tell they’re moving as to not get in the way or work.”
Brother may have been bragging once more, nevertheless, he certainly had good reason to brag about this car. It was far better than any competitor managed after more than 2 decades of progress!
It did make me wonder for a second - about how they could possibly lose their position - yet it was ironically likely due to them all being so hard working unlike Klaus. There is no way either father or brother would have turned their attention to the video game until it could have been considered too late; from there it would only require one player assassin to slip through the gaps.
With how large HERO was, there was no chance that they had no assassins, it would be easy enough to not only steal any information they wanted but kill any of the members of this family of mine. Somehow I found a growing fire starting under my skin at the thought of those scum acting all confident despite their success coming from complete luck.
You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.
Considering daddy & brother were already outside the car - I decided to follow behind to get a good look at the city around us. We were already far up above the skies of the city thanks to using the holo-way which literally just worked as a hologram road that worked to guide the hover tech on the more expensive vehicles like our own.
One needs a special licence to drive on these special hologram roads that threaded its way throughout the entire German empire & beyond; though the entire requirement for it could be summarised as having enough money so it was often referred to as “the green-way” by those I met in my past life.
Instead of entering through the bottom like a serf, we were already at the top of one of the highest of the many white towers, each as modern & boring looking as the last.
Each tower had pretty much the exact same design - with the tops being clean & white like marble spears piercing through the clouds. Meanwhile, the further below the clouds, the more billboards there were
There were separate walkways for the different ‘classes’ of workers all in order to help them more easily get in and out of the different monoliths of capitalism without getting in the way of their betters. Even the quality of those advertisements changed according to “the layer” you lived in, so extreme that they would go back to paper based advertisements, never mind hologram or digital.
At our level, above the clouds, there wasn’t even a single advertisement to be seen. Something which was most certainly refreshing compared to my prior early life. Then again; I wasn’t exactly seeing much of the outside world during the last years of my life. Or the first years of this one.
Like before - there was little to nothing in the terms of words between the three of us - I just followed behind father as we walked from a luxurious car park to a path surrounded by brush. A sweet aroma of some flower or another wafted across my nose (once again I knew nothing about ‘mortal’ foliage so I couldn't tell what it was from).
A little surprising that such a weak plant life could survive so high up in the air. Yet we soon headed inside of a red carpeted, spruce framed, lift so I didn’t remain on that. Seemed the wood had been treated since it carried a faint scent of strawberries and apples; the ride down being just as comfortable as the one we had over here as we reached our floor with a *ding*
It was probably the top floor so that was hardly surprising.
Walking through the hallways, that just looked like one would expect a rich office belonging to an insanely rich family, we soon came to our destination at least. “Ah president you have finally arr- oh that child is here as well…”
At first, when father walked through the door with brother by his side, there was a respectful tone to the croaky old tone that faltered as soon as I entered. What I saw was just a room filled with crusty old coots sitting in their fancy spinny chairs with that air of “I can’t believe I have to breathe the same air with someone who has less than 100kℳ in their bank account” all around them. Their eyes pointing towards me were filled with a contempt I was used to; the contempt one gives to an urchin they see on the street.
“I’m raising Armor as the heir to our military division, Furstin, in addition to having her gain enough skill by the time she’s 7 to earn some gold medals in the firearms division.” Daddy obviously didn’t give a single hoot. He just stared coldly across the old men; afterall we had complete control over the company.
Still, these were old men who threw more childish tantrums than Alexis (never mind me & brother), so the most presentable of the bunch began to wag a fountain pen in my direction dismissively. “We accepted you taking her into the family on account of it being a supposed family friend's daughter yet letting some random girl take the reins she’s clearly not born for?”
He let out a long sigh - while shaking his head like the petulant child he secretly was inside - it didn’t seem he was done as he continued on. “There are side families with far more prospects, I’m not just saying that because we are the heads of the largest of those, she simply can’t compare to our own flesh and blood even from the lowest branches.
This isn’t just in terms of class &...”
Once more, he paused to look me up and down, with his eyes obviously lingering on my skin as well as hair which certainly didn’t seem like those of a model family heir. “... appearance; can she even fire a gu-”
“Armor, pen.” Seemingly sick of his shit - Daddy soon called out to me making brother nudge my shoulder as he had seemingly moved beside me while I was focusing on the coot. Not being one to refuse, I quickly drew my handgun with my right while the left came to meet the hammer. Pulling the trigger Jjust as I had the thing at the right angle - resulting in a *PAM* that made those old men scream in a pitch higher than me or my sister could ever manage.
A satisfying *ping* signalled that wagging pen splintering in itty bitty pieces while ink splattered on the white haired (yet not that wrinkly since they all had plenty of surgery done) man. “Wowie! Wookes wike my aim has impowved if I din’t hit his fwace!”
I couldn’t help exclaiming; the coot falling back with his ghastly complexion only hidden by the splashes of black that helped cover him. Could have done without the fresh smell of ‘watered flowers’ coming from the fancy pants he wore - I couldn’t help clicking my tongue. “Dat old fool ‘as wasted a perwfectly good 20kℳ if we don’t incloode da cost ov ‘is pwants, you should be carewful not ta keep idiowts wike ‘im when you take owver, bwother!”
“Indeed…” Brother swiftly played along. With an irritated tongue click following after my own as his cute little face scrunching up in disgust; thankfully mother had me bring scented hankies that I shared.
“Someone, take Mr. Koot Porshi out of the meeting already, before he makes even more of a fool out of our company with his baseless & rash judgements!” Daddy yelled into an intercom - atop the large meeting table - which was promptly followed by some armed security ‘politely’ coming to pick him up.
Sadly, the rest of the meeting was exactly what one would expect.