CHAPTER 230: HEAD HUNTING (2)

Before he began his interviews, Jack fetched Madison and Isabella. Madison, because she was in charge of AI development, and Isabella, because she knew more about business than he did.

Because it was late at night in the physical world, each person he copied would appear lying down, asleep. So after summoning each person, he would make them unconsciously obedient, tell them to get dressed, have them sit in the gazebo, then tell them to forget about how they got to their chair.

This avoided any embarrassment from appearing partially or fully unclothed in his soul space.

The first person he summoned was a middle-aged woman named Patricia. She was the CTO of a smaller AI company, and Phineas had said that besides being savvy, she was also concerned about the direction her company was headed.

After explaining how and why she was sitting in front of him, she gave him an almost dismissive look and said, "Young man, I don’t know how you did all this, but I must say that I am uncomfortable working for someone as young as you."

From her look and tone, he could tell she was not someone he could work with. She seemed like the type that would only respect people she had worked with for a long time, or had had many years to observe. Quick to judge, slow to respect.

He deleted her copy and template and summoned the next person on his list.

A current CEO, a COO, two CTOs, and a VP of technology later, and Jack was really appreciating how luck he’d been with Phineas. The man was incredibly humble and supremely reasonable compared to the other people Jack had interviewed so far.

He was down to two people on the list Phineas had given him. A man Phineas had said was a bit eccentric, and a woman who was currently between jobs, having recently resigned from her position as VP of operations for BuyMoor the largest online retailer on the planet.

The VP of operations, Heidy Oakland, had remained silent on her resignation, but there were rumors that she had left because of advances from Theodore Moor, the founder and president of BuyMoor.

When he located the VP in a snapshot, he found her sleeping with, and spooning, another woman.

The sight didn’t bother him because it just meant he probably didn’t need to worry about her taking a romantic interest in him. He had enough girls already.

Once she was seated in front of him, he began his introduction. He explained where she was and how she got there.

Next, he described the company he wanted to create, his goals for the company, and his overall vision for the future.

Finally, he explained a bit about Genesis Heart and what he could do with it, finishing with a description of soul bonds and why he would need her to accept one if she wanted to work for him.

When he finished, she said, "I am very interested in the opportunity you are presenting me. However, this is something that I need to decide jointly with my partner Cindy. I ask that you summon her as well, and treat us as a package deal."

He nodded. "Sure, that’s not a problem, just a moment."

He paused Heidy, so she would not witness his summoning and obedience modification process, then summoned Cindy.

Once Cindy was ready, he un-paused Heidy and replaced the chair Heidy was sitting on with a small loveseat, and had Cindy sit next to Heidy.

Both women looked to be in their early to mid-thirties, and they slept naked, so he knew they were fit.

Heidy was blond, blue-eyed, and tall, while Cindy had dark brown hair, brown eyes and was shorter.

As soon as both women were seated again, Jack repeated his introduction for Cindy’s benefit. She listened attentively, only occasionally glancing at Heidy as Jack spoke.

When he finished, Cindy turned to Heidy and said, "Holy shit! Please tell me this is not a dream."

Heidy reached over and pinched Cindy’s forearm. Hard.

"Ow! Fuck! Was that really necessary?!" exclaimed Cindy.

"Did that feel like a dream?" said Heidy, sounding a touch exasperated.

"Okay, fine. But did you have to pinch me so hard?" The way Cindy had complained reminded him a bit of Naoko.

Ignoring Cindy’s complaint, Heidy turned to Jack and asked, "Can I assume you have questions for us before you make any decisions?"

"Yes, I’ll start with an open-ended question. Assuming all the AI models will be provided for you, already trained, and all you need to do is host them and provide the usual AI services with them, how would you proceed?"

What followed was a detailed step-by-step description of how to build a company. Madison and Isabella asked the occasional question, but it was clear to them that Heidy knew her shit.

When she was finished, Jack said, "That was very impressive and more detailed than I had expected."

Then, turning to Cindy, he asked, "What role would you play in all this?"

Cindy glanced at Heidy, who gave her a tiny nod. "I’ve never worked at the same company as Heidy. Partly because we worried about accusations of nepotism, and mostly because I wanted to be judged on my own merits."

Then she grabbed Heidy’s hand and laced their fingers together before she turned back to Jack and said, "I assume Heidy asked for me to be present so that we could decide together about your soul bond offer."

Heidy sighed and said, "Cindy is assistant VP of data center operations for Yoctoly. If you’ll allow, I want to put her in charge of your data center build-out project. She should have been VP of data center operations, but..."

Jack nodded. "I’m familiar with the problem. My money manager had the same problem. Made it easy to poach her."

From everything he’d heard, Heidy and Cindy were the best choice, by far, and he hoped they would actually accept his soul bond offers.

He asked them both some more questions to determine if they had skeletons in their closets or other potential legal issues. What he learned was that Heidy had left BuyMoor because she disagreed with their plans to replace employees with AI, and he learned that his suspicions were correct: Cindy was a bit of a masochist.

Satisfied that they were who he wanted to help build Radius 10K, he said, "Well, I’m satisfied. All that’s left is to answer any questions you have."

"Just how intimate are these soul bonds?" asked Heidy.