George's face flashed on the screen so quickly he may have imagined it. Except George had never been noted for his creativity. Other things, surely, but being creative in George's line of work had been the downfall of many of George's competitors. Following protocol, George wiped everything except the disguised non-programmable chip. As the device started the bootstrapping process, George left the workbench and ordered takeout - 1 Orange Chicken, 1 Beef Choy Fan, 1 Egg Roll, and an order of steamed white rice. Monica's protocols were as severe as the cost of ignoring them. George himself had seen to what happened to the last Owner who made this particular order and threw the food out in the garbage.
3 minutes after his order, there was a banging on his front door. George palmed his gun and headed for the door. Swinging it wide open, he stood naturally, allowing his to fill the space between his form and the doorframe. Outside stood a… human, with his hand raised as if to knock again. George waited. Patiently. The teenager frantically wiped pouring sweat with a magically-produced handkerchief while stammering through the doubtlessly also well-rehearsed words, "We had a cancellation for the same order and your address was nearby. You don't mind, right?" George minded. Instead of saying what he thought however, he pulsed his , watching in silent laughter as the youth's expression moved to absolutely stricken, to cover swapping his gun for the roll of notes on the table beside the door. Moving his hand into the open eased the delivery rider's expression, as did peeling off several notes. "No," George finally lied, causing the kid's head to snap up from the roll of green as he took the outstretched bag and replaced it with the money.
This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.
George hummed as he moved back to the island - good food prepared by one's personal chef hadn't taken him much time to get used to, and now he even had standing orders to have Andre chauffeured to restaurants and events ahead of him. He broke the egg roll roughly, a plastic-wrapped package falling out. Giving it a cursory glance, he opened the box of rice, spooned on some chicken, and got to work. George and the update finished at the same time. Grunting in satisfaction, he swiftly unwrapped the package to reveal what looked like an SD card. Positioning the item in the glow of the laptop screen revealed luminescent marks superimposed over the serial number, which George swiftly input at the prompt. The screen went dark.
He replaced the old, with the new 'SD card' and winced as a few points of light winked in and out of existence around the room and, he presumed, around the house - visual notification of the nano-circuitry in the anti-bug paint getting to work. George came to a realization: whoever had attempted to bug his place was good. He hadn't even felt the tell-tale hairs on the back of his neck going up the longer he was in the room, although he felt them now that the tension was gone. He made a mental note to add the standard 0.03% tip to his tithe. R&D was the one department he had never been allowed to work - Director's orders.
Scrolling data persisted on the screen for a few moments before a chat box discreetly popped up.
