Turbine City Update #2

I kicked ass today with my presentation for the InterBionics people.

We woke up early, had a breakfast/meeting in a meeting room at the hotel. Margo was wearing a pinstripe charcoal suit with a pink shirt and had her hair pulled back. She was more tense then I have seen her, and was downing coffee like a trucker. We did a run-through of the Delphi presentation then headed over to InterBionics.

You've probably seen pictures of the IB headquarters in magazines or on TV - it's a modern building that looks like a big inverted aluminum wedge, surrounded by a park-like campus. We went out there in a rented mini-van and set up in one of their spacious modern conference rooms. The place looks like the Death Star on the inside, with polished black marble floors, recessed lighting and graceful hammered steel walls. All that's missing is the stormtroopers.

I don't know what they put in the water over there, but the InterBionics team we meet all look like the German Olympics team in chic suits. There's six of them, and they're all fit, trim Northern European types - including the Ice Queen, a mean looking blonde with nice legs. We introduce ourselves and share pleasantries and we meet the big guy, the director of IB's new West Coast division, Jason Delacroix.

Delacroix looks like The Devil, as played by a generically handsome soap opera actor. He's wearing the InterBionics uniform, a fitted dark suit and narrow tie. I can appreciate good grooming and nice clothes, but this guy takes it to a higher level. Seriously, it looks like he got a last minute detailing by a bunch of handmaidens before he walked into the room. There's not a hair out of place. Delacroix has slicked dark hair and a precisely groomed Van Dyke beard framing his impossibly symetrical and chiseled face. He has piercing blue eyes (contacts?) and arching expressive eyebrows (looks like he plucks them.) Again, not gay, but he's a good looking cat.

He shake hands with us all and I can tell Margo and Loretta are sort of taken back by how fucking good looking Lord Satan is. Loretta actually blushes. When he gets to me he gives me a strong handshake and says, "Ah, Mr Mackenzie. Your reputation precedes you. We're all great admirers of your Venus marketing campaign. Quite clever. Welcome." He holds my hand a fraction of a second longer than you would find acceptable, and I feel steel in his grip. I return his iron handshake and smile. "Thank you very much." I swear, if I didn't have mid-range super-strength he might have hurt me.

It dawns on me as I sit down: this fucker's a super-villain.

Margo and Keith start their intro while I hook my laptop up to their projector. The IB folks are very attentive and all have excellent posture. I look at them. Yeah, this smells like a Covert Evil Organization. Maybe they're all genetically engineered supermen or something or pod people or Cthulhu cultists or some shit. And Jason Delacroix, what kind of name is that? That's a villain name. He might as well call himself Angus McEvil or Damien Devious or something.

Anyway, I do my presentation, Margo and Keith field questions from the Hitler Youth, and everybody seems happy. I repeatedly catch Loretta staring at Delacroix.

We all shuffle out, smiling and chatting. Delacroix stops Margo with a soft hand to her elbow, and they talk in low voices at the doorway of the conference room. He says something that makes her laugh - dick! - and then gives her a warm two-handed Bill Clinton handshake. Margo gives us a little thumbs up as she rejoins the group.

"I think we're in," she says in the elevator.

Yeah, I think, we're in a web of evil woven by a master villain.

Maybe.