Plot Introduction
This novel is the first in a series about "The Company" and its servants, human and otherwise. The series continues with Sky Coyote, Mendoza in Hollywood, The Graveyard Game, and The Life of the World to Come. The collection Black Projects, White Knights consists of Company stories, and there are allusions in the collection Mother Ægypt and Other Stories.
The story is told by Mendoza, a cyborg botanist. In the introduction, she describes a 24th century organization called Dr. Zeus Inc., or simply "The Company". The Company has the secrets of immortality and time travel. Unfortunately the immortality treatment can only be used on young children; and time travel is difficult, expensive, and only possible when going into the past and returning to your own time. History cannot be changed.
Dr. Zeus uses the technology simply to get rich. By travelling far into prehistory, the company creates its own immortal cyborg agents, who then have the mission of preserving cultural artifacts and other valuable items for sale in the 24th century. Usually these items are hidden in safe places, but in the case of extinct species, for instance, they are kept in secret Company caches run by the cyborgs. In the 24th century the Company then 'finds' the long-lost objects and sells them.
The cyborgs are expected to arrive in the 24th century the old-fashioned way, by living through the intervening millennia. On the way, they can create more cyborgs from those who would otherwise die as children.
Read more about this topic: In The Garden Of Iden
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