So they would need a special training center, one for the Project alone, one where they could learn all the exotic miscellany of skills they would need in Dimension X. J's purchase had just taken care of the land for that. But he would have a good deal more to do before there was a training center out there in Herefordshire. He would need to go over the house and grounds with a fine-tooth comb. Then he would have to confer with Blade, with the best trainers in MI6, with the Project's psychologists. They would all have ideas on what the center would need. He wanted to pick their brains as thoroughly as possible before moving in as much as one stick of furniture.

And perhaps the estate would be good for more than a training center. Every one of Lord Leighton's new ideas meant more paperwork, more office space, more laboratory space. There wasn't much room left in the underground complex below the Tower. What there was, they were reserving for the computer itself. That monster could not be moved at all, at least not without a million-pound bill and a year's delay in the Project. Nor could they expand the complex much farther-at least not without another huge bill. Carving tunnels and chambers out of London's bedrock wasn't cheap.

Moving some of the laboratories and things out to Herefordshire was definitely worth considering. The estate could become a whole annex to the London complex, taking some of the strain off it. Annex West. Yes, that might be a good name. And it certainly was a good idea. It was such a good idea, in fact, that J kept thinking it over all the way back to London.