"Afternoon," Kerry greeted them briefly. She laid her leather portfolio and her PDA down by the chair at the head of the table and walked over to the well stocked sideboard to get herself a glass of iced tea. Even with her back turned, she could sense eyes on her, but she took her time pouring her drink, mixing a spoonful of honey into the glass before she returned to the place she'd chosen.

Her conference room, her chair. Kerry sat down and leaned on the chair arm, sipping her tea as she regarded the room. "Mr. Quest? Are we ready to start? I've got a full afternoon scheduled besides this." Of course, if Dar had been there, it would have been her chair. It was the one she always used in this room and if Kerry concentrated hard enough, she could almost convince herself she caught a hint of Dar's usual perfume lingering on the leather.

Looking like he smelled cabbage, Quest walked stiffly over to the other end of the table and sat down in the seat facing Kerry. "Thank you for allowing us to use your conference space, Ms. Stuart. I'm sure we all appreciate being out of the heat and sitting somewhere comfortable." He looked at the rest of the room's occupants. "Would you all like to take a seat? I don't really want to waste..." His eyes flicked to Kerry's briefly. "Anyone's time."

"Fine," Michelle replied for all of them. She took a seat mid-way down the table, and Shari settled in next to her. They were both in smart, well-cut business suits, and despite the heat Michelle at least, had managed to retain her air of crisp professionalism.

The Tech TV reporter, Kerry noted, was nowhere to be seen.

The representatives from the two other companies remaining in the bidding sat down across from them in the center, and Quest's two attendants joined him at the far end. Kerry took the opportunity to lean back in her chair and hike one denim covered knee up to rest against the table edge.

Shockingly unprofessional. She took a sip of her tea. But then, so was her techno-nerd polo shirt whose sleeves were rolled up two turns to reveal her biceps. "I'm glad you felt comfortable enough to ask me to host this for you," Kerry said. "It's been a tough couple days for all of us, I'm sure."

"Say that again," the man immediately to her right sighed.

Rickenback, his name was, Kerry remembered. His company was one of ILS's bigger competitors, while the man next to him, John Sellars, was from a small outsourcing firm in the Midwest. Both had engineers with them, and both were male. It made an interesting counterpoint to both the Telegenics team, and their own.

Half men, half women. Kerry wondered if Quest had deliberately picked it that way. He seemed odd and disconnected enough to have. "Tom, did you say your hotel didn't have power?"

"Yeah," Rickenback agreed. "Let me tell you, Kerry, you may like this swamp pit, but you can keep it." He gave her a wry look. "How in the hell do you deal with this heat all the time?"

"We stay inside." Kerry waited for the chuckles to fade. "Drink a lot of this." She held up her iced tea.

"And don't wear much clothing," Shari snarked.

Kerry ignored her. "Well, Mr. Quest? The floor is yours. If you need anything in the way of presentation material, let me know." There was no point in antagonizing him any further, was there? "We're all ears."

Quest hesitated, and then gave her a gracious nod before he got up and walked a little to one side, turning to face them. "Thank you all for coming out here," he said. "I realize it was short notice, and I realize we've all had some personal challenges the past day or so. However, I have a project to get started, and I don't have time to waste on waiting for things to smooth over." He cleared his throat. "So."

They all leaned forward toward him, except for Kerry. She remained relaxed in her chair, slowly sucking on her iced tea. The taste of raspberries and honey filled her mouth, and she let her peripheral vision take in the rest of the table as they waited for Quest to fill them in.

"I've heard a lot of talk the last two days," Quest said. "I've heard proposals, and concepts, and mostly I've heard bullshit."

Kerry's eyebrow quirked, along with the corners of her lips.

"All I've heard is promises and hot air. All of you think you can do the job I need to get done. But all I've seen is paper and smoke," Quest went on.

"Excuse me," Shari started speaking. "What did you expect us to do, bring the technology with us and put it on your desk?"

It was, Kerry acknowledged, a surprisingly reasonable question. "Mr. Quest, you got proposals because that's what you asked for." She threw her own comment in. "Are you looking for a demonstration of the technology?"

"Yeah," Tom Rickenback spoke up. "You called us down here to respond to your request for technical specifications. What exactly did you expect?"

Quest waited them out. He paced near the wall, past the sedately framed international certification certificates. "This is what I expect." He turned and put his hands on his hips, brushing aside the khaki folds of his jacket. "I want to see you deliver. I have four ships I need to fit out for business in less than three months. I want each one of you to take one ship, and put your money where your mouths are."

What? Kerry put her glass down.

"Whoever does the best job for the best price, gets the rest of our fleet." Quest folded his arms across his chest. "Twelve ships."

There was a conspicuous silence after he finished talking. The occupants of the table all looked at each other. Kerry finally broke the tension with a slight chuckle. "Okay, let me get this straight," she said. "You basically want to get your four ships equipped for free, so you figure by tempting us with a contract you'll get that to happen, because all of us are more than capable of putting a network just about anywhere."

It even got a smirk out of Shari, she noticed. Michelle licked the tip of her index finger and made an unobtrusive swipe in the air, before she settled back in her seat and folded her own arms.

Quest shrugged. "You can look at it that way, if you like. But the offer is real, and it's here on paper. So." He walked over and removed four reams from his briefcase and slapped them down on the table. "Put up, or shut up, as they say. Either you're in and interested, or you can take off now, and if you're lucky get a flight out of this place."

His assistant got up and lifted the papers, walking around to distribute them. He handed Kerry hers last, stopping a little short and forcing her to extend her arm for it. "Sorry," he apologized, handing it over. "Here you go."

Quest waited until they all had their copies. Then he closed his briefcase with a snick and picked it up. "I'll be at the Intercontinental," he stated. "Present yourselves with your signed copies there tomorrow if you intend on participating."

His eyes scanned the room. "We expect to be taken seriously. If you can't give us evidence of that, we reserve the right to reject your bid."

"So, you're saying no balloons tied to the paperwork?" Michelle asked in a dry tone.

He signaled to his assistants. "Thank you again, Ms. Stuart, for the use of your facilities. I'm sure everyone was a lot more comfortable here than they would have been at the hotel's conference hall. There's no AC there."

"My pleasure," Kerry murmured.

"Can't believe you haven't fixed that problem yet," Shari commented. "Must be almost as frustrating as living with Dar."

Instead of blushing, Kerry felt the odd sensation of a cold chill flushing through her body instead. She barely recognized the churning fury in time to take a strong hold of it, hearing the soft creak of leather as her frame reacted instinctively and tensed up.

She kept her eyes on the contract, forcing her hand to move and flip the first page over. After running her eyes over the first paragraph three times without reading it, she finally looked up, giving Shari a bland look. "You want me to snap my fingers and have the power come back on? Sure." Kerry obligingly lifted her free hand and snapped her fingers. "Since you think everything we do requires no effort."

The lights flickered suddenly in the room, and everyone looked up, startled. Kerry straightened a little, cocking her head as she heard a low thrum, then a series of snaps, before the lights brightened again and steadied.

"What the hell was that?" Tom asked. "You forget to pay the diesel bill, Kerry?"

Kerry scratched her jaw in bemusement. "Not exactly," she said. "That was our generator kicking off. We're back on city power," she admitted. "So I guess you can go back to your hotels and get comfortable with Mr. Quest's reading matter."

Quest tilted his head in her direction. "I'm looking forward to seeing you all tomorrow." He started to turn, then paused and met Kerry's gaze. "Thanks for fixing that little problem, Ms. Stuart. Good to see you living up to your reputation." He left the room, with his assistants trailing him as the rest of the people shuffled and started moving.

"Well." Tom eyed the contract. "Got a fax machine I can borrow, Kerry? Now that you fixed the power?" He managed a slight grin. "I don't mind stealing paper and a phone call from you since you'll have the home field advantage down here."

Kerry pressed the radio button on her cell phone. "Mayte?"

A moment later, her assistant answered. "Si?"

"Can you come down to the conference room please? I need something taken down to legal, and there are some people here who need to use the fax machine around the corner." Kerry put the document down, and rested her hands on the table.

"Yeah, he's right," Shari spoke up again. "We should get an advantage written in to make up for the bid being held down here. We have to get everything shipped in."

Kerry remained silent, her eyes dropping to her PDA as she opened it and started to scribe.

John Sellars spoke up, his voice quiet and gentle. "Good call on him getting those ships done, Kerry," he said. "Pretty slick, if you ask me.

He knows he'll get all the bells and whistles, and we'll be fighting each other to cut costs."

"Agreed. He's a player," Shari commented. "But then, so are we all."

"Mm." Kerry looked up from her screen as the door opened and her assistant entered. Mayte walked around the table and came to Kerry's side, keeping her eyes strictly on her boss. "Thanks Mayte." She held out the contract. "Can you tell them I need this reviewed for execution tomorrow? And show these gentlemen to the fax machine?"

"Of course." Mayte gave Kerry a smile. "Did you know we have the power on now? Everyone is cheering, except there were some people who I think really wanted to be sleeping in our office."

"Best news I had all day." Kerry returned the smile. "Tom? You wanted to send a fax? Anyone else?"

"We make our own decisions," Shari assured her. "We don't need our asses covered by our lawyers."

Tom stood up and hefted his bag. "Then you're a bigger idiot than you sound like," he told her briskly. "As well as being one of the biggest boors I've run across in a decade. Ma'am? After you." He courteously indicated Mayte precede him. "Gentlemen...ladies..." His eyes went to Shari. "Whatever. Have a great day."

He left with his associate. John Sellars and his assistant scuttled after him. "We'll take you up on that fax, Kerry, thanks." He gave her a half wave as they disappeared through the door.

That left Kerry with Michelle and Shari, a condition she had no intention of continuing. Accordingly, she picked up her cup. "Excuse me."

Michelle half stood. "Kerry, wait."

Her polite upbringing was sometimes very unfortunate. Kerry paused and waited, one eyebrow cocked in a reasonable imitation of her partner's attitude.

"Can we take you to dinner?"

Kerry almost laughed. "You're kidding, right?" she finally answered. "Come on, people. It's been a tough couple days. You think I'm into sitting and listening to bullshit all night?"

Shari snorted. "You just can't take it." She waved a hand. "None of you people have a sense of humor."

"I have a sense of humor," Kerry replied. "Jerks being rude don't qualify as funny in my world. Sorry about that."

"Well, if you..."

Michelle stood all the way up. "Shari, would you please shut the hell up," she said. "You're not making this situation any easier on any of us."

Shari's eyes narrowed, but she closed her mouth with a click of her teeth.