He now understood why they nick-named it The Factory.

A large, rather characterless and virtually windowless cuboid of aluminium on the outside, it stood alone on the outskirts of the city surrounded by a few palm trees and extensive parking. It was the sort of building that anyone with no imagination would have designed to make cars, trucks or something large, heavy and probably highly mechanical. He had thought as he first saw it, that it looked as though it belonged to the school of American hi-tech prison architecture, without the barbed wire and the watchtowers.

Inside though, you might have thought you were in a greenhouse at Kew on a glorious summer's day, such was the transformation.

The roof had been partly-glazed to filter natural sunlight to everywhere underneath, which was a veritable jungle of trees, large and small computers, desks and workstations, tropical ferns and plants of every different type and hue, pools, Jacuzzis and even a waterfall. The total effect was spectacular, perhaps even enchanting and certainly something that owed much more to Las Vegas hotels and resorts, than any theory of how the well-planned office should be designed.

He had never seen an office too, where the mode of dress was so casual and colourful, and where there was so much bare flesh. He felt positively overdressed, as most seemed to follow a dress code, that was based mainly on shorts or skirts to mid-thigh, bare midriffs, swimsuits, tight Lycra and comfortable cotton.

***

By one he had had the full open and uncensored tour and was sitting alone in one of the meeting areas, hidden in the luxuriant foliage, waiting for the lunch party to assemble.

He had been very impressed.

Zyzzx had developed an organisation where sales, support, development, programming and testing were completely integrated, that should have been the envy of every other computer software company. It would not be, as it was very much led by client demand and mutual vision, and owed only little to the egos and whims of those with power and control. Even, when a major development was instigated, it was often started by a customer demonstrating a particular need and showing how he had solved it with a competitor's product. This had been just the sequence of events that had led Zyzzx to want to acquire him and his software.

He had already seen how support was organised before and he was no less impressed with how they tackled programming work.

Not for them the rigid structures of formal code and strictures on masses of documentation and corporate standards. Every project would be broken into small tasks, with the interfaces and connections between them completely specified, each of which would if possible be less than three months work for a single programmer. But whereas all other companies would do each small task once, Zyzzx would always ask two or perhaps three people if it were very critical, to separately code each part. All modules would be tested together and the best would be chosen.

At first sight this would seem a wasteful process, but because there was always a backup and each module was relatively small, there was no need for full documentation, so programming speed was greatly increased. The approach also carried much less risk that a job would be late and also meant that if the product had to be expanded or improved in a particular area, you always had at least two people familiar with the methods and the all-important upgrade delivery time would be substantially reduced.

Testing of programs was flexible in one extreme and rigorous in the other, relying on the Internet to deliver test versions to large numbers of direct employees, selected clients and outworkers all over the world, so that the whims and perspectives of the widest number of different egos, races, tongues and nationalities could be used to develop and prove every facet of a new product. Every known defect and failure was properly logged and analysed in extensive centralised databases, in an attempt to reach that supposedly impossible goal of bug-free software.

He knew that they would probably not reach that goal, but then he also knew that no software had ever been delivered without an extensive list of dubious faults and features. At least he was sure that they would be closer than most!

Thinking back on what he had seen, one image kept coming back. He had seen and been allowed to watch a very heated discussion on how a specific problem should be solved. Nothing particularly unusual and different about how the arguments passionately progressed, except for the fact that the five participants, three male and two female, were all more or less naked in a Jacuzzi.

***

Russ was first to arrive and strode in arm extended wearing the sort of loud shirt and Bermuda shorts typical of American tourists. At least peer pressure in The Factory meant the cigar had to be absent. 'Well did you fuck the gorgeous Lucinda, last night?'

'No!' He did not like the question, so he gave an honest answer, based on the fact that she had made love to him last night and he had had the pleasure this morning.

'Par for the course!' Russ sat down opposite. 'She's as tight as a duck's arse, ever since that husband of hers died. Why a real man should drive into a bridge like he did, I don't know?'

At that moment Gaynor entered. 'Hi, boys! Food and drink's on it's way!' She was as ever immaculately dressed, but even she was showing a hint of midriff and her navel between a silk blouse tied at the waist and a pair of beautifully-cut slim, dark blue trousers.

'Is Lucinda with you?' As Gaynor sat down, his eyes glimpsed a sparkle in Gaynor's exposed navel.

She caught the expression of surprise in his face and immediately stood up again with her hands displaying her midriff. 'Do you like it?' She showed a sizeable diamond set in a ring held in a piercing. 'It was my husband's fiftieth birthday present to me! What else could he give the lady who has everything!'

'We'd all like to know, where else the needle went?'

Russ did not receive an answer as Lucinda entered quickly followed by two of her staff, with trays of sandwiches, salads, juices and the inevitable beer for the boss.

***

He was beginning to doubt that Russ had any good qualities and was feeling that he only owed his position due to his father's control of the company. That was until he saw his fast, expert and decisive performance at that lunchtime meeting.

In twenty minutes they had all eaten, Russ had announced that given an agreement on a price formula he would be keen to buy Medusa, he had delegated the setting up of a timetable to the other three and he had said good-bye to everybody.

'That was quick! I thought this could have gone on for hours.' He turned to Gaynor. 'How's Derek? Did he make the plane?'

'He's quite well really, considering. He's safely on his way home, now!' She reached in her bag and produced an envelope. 'He wrote this for you this morning. Would you like us to leave, so you can read it?'

'No! Thank you! I don't think that we have many secrets.' Unseen by her colleague, Lucinda winked back.

Derek's note was short and added little to what Gaynor had already told him, except that it gave him the power to selectively disclose at his discretion, anything he had been told about Medusa. As he had only met Derek for a day and they had only talked for perhaps three hours, it was unlikely that these revelations would amount to much.

As he finished he looked up. 'Well, I think it's just the matter of establishing the timetable, as Derek has not said anything here, that we don't all know.' He thought for a minute or so and wrote a few sentences on a sheet of paper. 'You know, that supposing Medusa successfully integrates and launches my software before their year end in March and then we base a price on their audited profits, which are due in late June. Then if all goes well, there's no reason why around the beginning of August we can't meet to stick everything together and sign it all. That would just about give us time to launch this time next year at COMDEX.'

'That's tight!' Lucinda was nodding agreement with his statement.

'Ah! But you will never make real money unless something is just more than a tiny bit difficult!'

Copyright 1999 by Ewart Higgins