Was that another sign I was bad with money, or a hint that I had way too much money and should spend it?

Both. Probably both.

Motoko sat quietly as the rest of Section 9 hung around, attending to... Whatever it was that was happening today. She'd gotten distracted remaking a song again, so she didn't pay attention to everything in the email past "Section 9 Meeting".

"Yeah yeah yeah," Hiromi scoffed, "I don't care what you say, a deal's a deal."

The person on the other end of the call probably answered. Motoko could have probably listened in, but that'd be rude.

Waiting for the call to be over, she glanced over at Malcolm, the guy scrolling through a car catalogue. No, a magazine on new ones? And paper, at that.

Oh, and he was crossing them out. Weird, but okay.

Her eyes fell on Ichi, who was playing on some old school arcade machine. He'd actually bought it from one of the game places with the money he'd earned from...

What was it again? Right, he'd bought another truck or two with the money he'd saved up, and had hired a couple of his cousins to help drive stuff around. It was like a little transportation business all of his own! How cute.

...Though thinking about it, how many cousins did he have again? She'd seen the list once over his shoulder, and the scroll bar was really small.

"-tired of waiting! You pay your debts, or you'll see what '75 percent of shares' really means!"

Oof, that sounded mean. Though if some start-up borrows money, it really is common decency to pay it back. Maybe she could take the owner on a gig? It'd basically be a charity thing, with her escorting the guy rather than him actually helping, but it might be enough for Hiromi to get off the guy's back.

The sound of someone blowing something caught Motoko's ear, and she turned to see Becca inspecting the gun she'd gotten from... Somewhere. Huh, she didn't recgonize it. Must've looted it from some overcompensating Scav though, because it was comically big. Probably going to be a showpiece though, that thing's ammo would probably cost way too much to actually keep using.

Nodding to herself, Becca lifted the gun up with ease, helped by her chrome enhancements, and placed the gun on the wall amongst all the others on the ceiling-high wall-to-wall gun display, before pressing a button to shift it to one of the other 19 possible display walls.

Some hollering off in the corner had her turning to stare as Maine, David, Pilar, and Dorio all sat in their operator chairs. She couldn't tell what they were controlling, but it must've been some sort of robot fight or something.

"Letting loose!" David yelled, and the other three cheered him on. A moment later they fell quiet, before bursting into another set of cheers.

Half a minute later and the sound of something rumbling reached Motoko's ears. Huh, probably a grenade going off a couple of streets over. Hope nobody got hurt!

Oh, something popped up in her vision. A purchasing request from Lucy and Kiwi? What? Why were they sending that to her?

She idly approved it anyway. They probably weren't asking for much.

In the corner of her eye, the TV, showing some figures of money or something, suddenly had all the numbers start flashing different colours and the arrows shfting directions. Motoko ignored it, because that was investments and stocks and bonds and other complicated money matters that she honestly felt better not thinking about.

"-ou understand then Sabu-chan?" Hirmoi sneered, like she the villain on some BD. "Good. I'll be expecting to see payment by the end of the week. Or you'll find yourself short a few... Well, let's just hope you don't have to find out."

Wow, that actually felt genuine! Maybe she'd want to star in a BD? That could be neat, though they might have to find a director or two willing to work with them.

"Sorry," Hiromi smiled bashfully as she finally ended the call. "He was being stubborn, but he finally agreed to pay back the loan he borrowed."

Motoko smiled back, but paused, and looked down at her chair.

Or rather, at the giant pile of money she was sitting on, it having grown to such an obnoxious size that they'd just taken out a wall and put most of it into the surrounding rooms, the floor they were on now staying stable only due to the plentiful solid gold scaffolding.

"Hey Hiromi?" Motoko asked, shivering slightly as a slightly cold gust of wind blew through the top of Arasaka Tower. Really shouldn't have tested those grenades here. Gotta get that fixed sooner or later.

"Yes Motoko?" Hiromi answered while idly throwing another wad of cash into the fire for warmth.

"Do we have too much money?"

Hiromi opened her mouth for a moment, speechless, and glanced meaningfully at the framed collage of pictures of CEO's smiling nervously as they handed declarations of ownership over to various members of Section 9 (i.e. whoever was in the area at the time) all around the world.

Then, before she could say anything, Motoko shrugged.

"Eh, nevermind, we're probably fine."