The Mech Touch

After they settled on a plan for their second designer baby, Gloriana soon paid another visit to the Dragon's Den to begin the lengthy process.

It just so happened that Ketis was undergoing the same ordeal, so the two had decided to travel together and talk about how they planned to raise their kids.

Gloriana had taken Aurelia and the cats with her. This left Ves by himself for half a day.

"Hm. I have rested long enough. I should ease back into my work."

There were a lot of items on the agenda. The ones he looked forward to the most was examining the results of the remaining mech design projects. He recalled that several of them had just completed the fabrication of the first production copies of their completed designs.

Before he was willing to check up on the final batch of mechs, he wanted to address a few other important developments.

He headed over to his office and sat down on his familiar comfy desk chair. He waited and studied the knick-knacks that he had put on display until his visitors finally arrived in person.

Chief Minister Raymond Billingsley-Larkinson and Chief Minister Novilon Purnesse both entered at the same time.

It was clear to see that they were ready to make an important presentation from their serious expressions and their slow gait.

Interestingly enough, Raymond carried a briefcase today. He had already brought props today in order to fill Ves in on a major development that had just reached its terminal phase.

"Welcome, gentlemen." Ves began as he gave the two older men a gracious smile. "Before we begin, tell me how the clan is doing from your perspective. Is there anything that stands out that you think is worthwhile to mention here today?"

Both Raymond and Novilon looked at each other. As two of the three chief ministers of the Larkinson Clan, they essentially ran the civilian side of the fleet. There were plenty of problems they could bring up, but whether it was wise to bring them to the patriarch's attention was another matter.

Ves may carry the title of patriarch, but he was far too busy with his primary vocation to waste much time on governance. The office of the chief ministers emerged in the first place so that he could delegate much of his authority to others in order to run the clan better.

So far, this new governance system worked well enough. The Larkinsons continued to have their needs met while the clan administration continued to become more comprehensive.

The Larkinson Clan already possessed most of the elements of a state. There were just a few areas that still needed to be addressed, and this meeting centered around one of those essential building blocks.

Novilon Purnesse, the son of Foreign Minister Shederin Purnesse, decided to go first.

"We have noticed signs that you are willing to relax your insistence on keeping all of our clansmen and assets in the same fleet. Your investigation into building our own planetary manufacturing complex, your attempts to establish a so-called Expedition Hall and your inquiries into setting up an internment camp on a settled planet to house the bulk of our alien captives are all indicators that you are open to a change in policy."

Ves furrowed his brows. "That may be the case, but I have yet to make any solid decisions. For now, I still want to keep the bulk of our clansmen in the same place. No matter what, the core foundation of our clan should always be rooted in our fleet. This is nonnegotiable. If we ever create branches in numerous fixed locations, then they must only be manned by a small proportion of Larkinsons, preferably those that we can afford to lose if accidents occur."

He had thought about the Larkinson Clan's future situation and thought it was acceptable to become a little more flexible. In any case, his fleet was already overcrowded to an extent and could use the opportunity to dump the excess in other places.

Novilon looked happier. "I will not hide my thoughts and think it is better for us to spread our people and shift more of them to fixed locations such as Davute. There is much we can do to accelerate and improve the development of our clan by reversing our isolation from the local community. If we establish bases and station more Larkinsons in different major star systems, we can forge better business deals with material wholesalers, industrial manufacturers and specialist suppliers. We can also form our own distribution network that will help us reduce our reliance on other companies to ship our physical products."

"Aside from that, setting up branches on different planets will also give our clansmen the option to live outside a ship environment." Raymond added.

Ves did not have a good opinion on that. To him, the Larkinsons should always consider their fleet to be their home. It was the only way to stay safe in the long term. He looked down on all of the people and organizations willing to fight to the death to defend their fixed territory and assets.

Starships were much more convenient in comparison! Sure, the living space aboard them was limited, but who knew when their planetary outposts would get in the way of an enemy invasion one day? The clansmen who chose to settle on the surface could all die on the hills they chose to embrace!

The chief ministers heard enough from Ves. They were glad that the patriarch was truly willing to loosen the rules.

Raymond made a suggestion that was related to this topic.

"If you are willing to allow Larkinsons to leave the fleet and reside on different settlements, then I suggest we erect a new LMC branch headquarters in the Davute System."

"Why?"

"Given that you plan to design multiple commercial mech in your next design round, I think it is best that the LMC lays the groundwork to produce and sell the new models in-house. While I suggest that we can still outsource production to third-party manufacturers, we should limit this strategy to the zones surrounding Krakatoa."

Ves rubbed his smooth-shaven chin as he considered this rational strategy. "I have to admit that your proposal makes a lot of sense. Let's just say that I am open to the idea as long as we don't have to shift tens of thousands of clansmen to Davute. We do need to open up our own production and sales channels in at least one major market."

"Then we shall work on it. I shall give you an update in a few weeks. We have already laid some of the groundwork."

After chatting about a few lesser issues, Ves finally wanted to come to the main point for today.

"I have heard that our Financial Ministry is finally ready to set up our own 'central bank'."

Raymond Billingsley-Larkinson became more animated at that. This had been one of his primary preoccupations as chief minister.

"That is correct. Although it may sound absurd to establish a central bank and our own mint so soon, it is better to do this earlier than later. In five or ten years, our clan will hopefully reach a scale where we need to exert more control over our internal economy. Controlling our own currency can play a great role in softening any eventual crises that might occur in the future."

"I understand the arguments. Please move on to the exciting part where you introduce our own currency."

"Very well."

Raymond steadily unlocked and opened his briefcase. He reached inside and withdrew a handful of metal coins before placing them on Ves' desk.

The chief minister presented four different coins. Each of them possessed several commonalities but also differed by size, color and markings.

"Since we have decided to transition away from using the hex credit, we have performed many studies and focus testing to determine the name of our own currency. It needs to be short and easy to spell in order to ease their use in our daily lives, but it also needs to be unique and iconic enough to be associated with our clan. After months of consideration, we have settled on calling our currency the 'lark'."

A few moments of silence passed as Ves took in this short and odd-sounding name.

"The… lark?"

"The lark." Raymond confirmed. "It makes sense if you think about it. First, it is simple and easily rolls off the tongue. Second, it is a highly uncommon word to describe a currency and will not lead to any confusion. Third, lark is strongly identifiable to the Larkinson Clan as it is literally a shortened version of our clan name."

"That is true, but… really?" Ves looked skeptical. "Lark doesn't exactly sound serious enough to my ears."

"You will get used to it, sir. It is a neutral word that sounds friendly and universal enough to gain everyone's acceptance. It is highly unlikely for the word to cause offense to our diverse members."

Ves decided to shrug past the odd-sounding name and turned his attention to the coins.

"I see you have taken the liberty to mint a few coins."

"That is correct. These are not purely commemorative in nature. While we expect most clansmen to transact directly from their bank accounts, in order to reinforce the existence of the lark, we also intend to circulate physical coins in the local communities. This will hasten everyone's acceptance of it while at the same time make their wealth more concrete. It is hard to understand how rich everyone has gotten when their money is only available in the form of abstract numbers on projected screens."

"You have a point." Ves said as he picked up the smallest coin of the bunch. It was smaller than the size of his fingertip. "Give me the rundown on these interesting coins."

"When it came to designing the coins, we considered many different coin designs and coin denominations. Ultimately, we decided to stick to a simple format and adopted the metric system to divide the different coins."

Raymond reached out and picked up the second-smallest copper-like coin. "This is the base coin, and it is relatively high in value. This is 1 lark, and it corresponds to a value of 0.001 MTA credits according to our initial valuation."

"How did you come to this exchange rate?"

"We plan to peg the lark to the MTA credits in the beginning, sir. That does not mean we intend to keep it that way, but our internal economy is too small at the moment to justify this move. In order to keep our economy consistent in the first decades, we believe it is best to value the lark at a level lower than the MTA credit, but not too low. Given our rising prosperity, in the near future, an average clansman should be able to spend several larks a day without problem."

"You have a highly optimistic view about our financial growth."

Raymond chuckled and put down the copper-like coin so that he could grab the smallest coin in black.

"If the lark is too valuable, then this 1 millilark coin should help out. They can be handed out to children in order to teach them the value of money."

"I see. What about the other two coins?"

They did indeed look like toys to Ves.

The old chief minister put down the millilark coin and held out the second-largest coin colored in silver. "This is a step up from the 1 lark coin and should not be common. This is the 1 kilolark coin and corresponds to 1 MTA credit."

This coin was already unaffordable to most Larkinsons!

Ves grabbed the silver coin and noted that it was as big as a medallion. He liked the weight and the head of the Golden Cat stamped on the front side of the coin.

"A kilolark, huh?"

"Yes, but that is not the most valuable coin we intend to mint. In order to truly establish the prestige of our currency, we intend to mint a limited quantity of 1 megalark coins. They are our most extravagant physical coins as they are supposed to represent a value of 1000 MTA credits. Suffice to say, they will likely not be used for many years, and even then they will only be used for ceremonial purposes."

Raymond passed a coin that was bigger and heavier than all of the other three coins.

As Ves held the hefty piece of metal, he noted that it was the size of a drink coaster but substantially thicker.

The megalark was not meant to be stored and carried inside an old-fashioned wallet!

"The lark and the design of the coins before you is the result of many months of work. With this currency, we are ready to bring our Larkinson Clan one step closer to functioning as a complete state. What do you think, Ves?"

Ves stared deeply at the golden coin whose front side presented an empty cat head.

"This… is boring as hell." He pronounced in a flat tone. "This hunk of shaped alloy does not look and feel as if it is worth 1000 MTA credits at all. Its design is not only bland, but the coins themselves are all without any hint of life!"