25 Dreamy

As I made my way back to my room with my team, I could hear people talk about how many questions they were able to answer and how hard the proofs were.

Nadya mentioned, "I proved 4 of the 5, but I spent over an hour on the first one..."

"I solved it in 5 minutes. There was an easy way to go about it."

"Ai, are you serious? How?"

"L'Hôpital's rule, my friend."

"Yeah, I sniffed that out too, but I got stuck on proving the Eigen values," Isaac throws in.

Turning to Will, I ask, "And you, Will? How'd it roll for you?"

He shrugs, "It was alright..."

He keeps saying that he is fine... but he's not really fine...

And that's when someone called on my Motorola.

~~ " Hey, I just met you, and this is crazy, But here's my number, so call me, maybe!" ~~

Naday side-eyed me, "Ai, What the fuck is this ringtone Max..."

"Sorry, guys, gotta take this call," I say, stepping away to answer.

It was some random number, but I figured it was worth picking up.

"Yes?"

"Good Morning, Is this Dreamland Net?"

Morning?! I got confused for a second, but then I realised that it's 11 AM in New York now.

"Yes, I'm Max Sullivan from Dreamland Net. How can I assist you today?"

I need to quickly make a business number and buy a new phone for business-related stuff, because 'Yes?' Is probably not the most professional start to the conversation.

"I'm John Turner from Adomi, I'm making the call, because we would like to discuss making an enterprise contract for GAI Weather. We sell watches with special features and we are looking to spice things up with weather info from your app."

"Ah, got it. A pleasure to chat, John. An enterprise contract for GAI Weather, hmm? What is your user base size?"

"We have over eighty thousand users at the moment. We were thinking we could make a deal based on that. We would offer you $1 per user every month. Is your software patented?"

$1 per user every month... That's over $80000 coming in every month. Now my heart was rushing, but I decided to push it.

"It's in the final stage of the patent process at the moment. When it comes to the price... Do you have any idea as to how many times your users check the weather on their watch?"

"Ah, yes. We do. On average, it's 25"

"You must already know that the usual way someone would need to pay $9/month for this kind of treatment. I can make a proposition for $2 per user each month."

"The highest we can go is $1.5"

I made it seem like I was thinking for a while, and said,"...Shure, I can agree on that..."

"We should set up a meeting then," John said, sounding satisfied

I thought that it would take some time before anyone reached out to me, so I decided to hold off on lawyering up and handling the formalities.

Thankfully, I was quick on my feet.

 "Absolutely, I'll get in touch with my lawyer, and he'll sort out the details for our meeting with the team at Adomi."

"Thank you, see you then"

"Appreciate the call, John. Take care and speak soon", I said and put the phone back in my pocket.

For a hot minute, I was second-guessing, thinking I might've stumbled into a scam. I mean, this deal is six times cheaper than the usual way.

But then reality hits–it's a whopping $120,000 each and every month!

Stacking those numbers would've taken me a minute if I relied solely on the app.

With all that swirling in my head, I finally made it back to my room and flopped onto the bed. After being glued to a seat for over four hours, I was straight-up drained.

Wasn't planning on it, but the next thing I know, I'm asleep. Sometimes, your body just decides to hit the reset button.

But this wasn't your typical doze, oh no. As I drifted off, I plunged into a dream where everything split into four eerie, endlessly repeating quadrants.

The nets turned pure white on both sides. Every night, I'd venture into one of those tunnels, and tonight was no exception.

I opted for the left side this time, not the right where I heard the creepy voices last time. As usual, the nets sealed shut behind me, locking me away in this constricting tunnel. The tightness of the space pressed on me.

Moving ahead, taking my time, not rushing – it's become a bit of a ritual.

Yet, something felt off this time. The tunnel began to expand, widening as if nets were brought to life. Gradually, I stumbled upon what could pass as a room, an abnormality in the usual pattern.

A room, but not just any room—a perfect square.

The nets seemed to draw closer, creating an illusion of a seamless white wall.

Standing in the center of the room, I was curious about what would happen. This was entirely new to me.

"Shhhh..."

I heard a sound like an old radio desperately trying to catch a signal, a hushed static...

"Impetum in tressis... Impetum in tressis... Prodiderunt nos"

The voice echoed, similar to the last time... yet it was different. It did not come from the same entity.

I had dabbled in some Latin before, but this time around, I couldn't grasp everything. However, what did manage to decipher was:

"Attack on three... Attack on three... They *** us"

At this moment I decided to call out to the unknown being in Latin, "Quis es?", meaning "Who are you?" 

"Quis es?! Ego sum dominus!" - "I am the Lord!", The voice answered

And that's when I woke the fuck up.

It was 5 AM in the morning, but I was asleep for over 11 hours!

Prodiderunt? I needed to quickly check what that meant.

Other than that, it seemed like this entity was the Lord that I had heard about before.

I opened up my laptop and a translator, "Preadherent" - "Betrayed"

"Attack on three... They betrayed us"

Us? Why Us?

Was I somehow connected to this entity?

This was a lot to take in, and who was I supposed to believe? About what was I supposed to believe?

I didn't have any information to begin with!

...

Gathering my wits, I concluded that it was high time to reach out to a law firm.

Over the past seven weeks, the GAI Weather app has raked in over $15,000, but for a deal of this magnitude, that might just barely be enough to hire a lawyer.

I called DLE Paper and after a 30-minute talk on the phone, they have agreed to lend me a lawyer for the next 1 month until the deal is set in stone. All for just $10,000 and another $30,000 when the deal is complete.

That's the United States of America for you.

With that task checked off, the clock hadn't even struck 7 AM yet. Figured I'd hit the city and snag myself a fresh new business phone. 

Despite the early hour, 7 AM, the streets were already buzzing with crowds, folks coming to and from the shops along one of the main streets near Imperial College. The city was alive and kicking.

Swiftly, I stumbled upon a phone shop sporting a sleek, modern glassy finish. It seemed like the kind of place that could hook me up with the business phone I had in mind.

An array of mobile phones of all kinds of producers lay on display, adorning the walls on both sides of the shop.

I came up to the receptionist, "Hey, I would like to buy a phone"

She looked at me for a second, probably surprised by my accent. I'm not from the UK after all.

And then she smiled, "Yes! Do you have anything on your mind?"

"I would like to purchase a flagship phone", I said with a straight face.

"An iPhone, perhaps?" Her eyes lit up, a hint of excitement in her voice. Maybe she gets a little something extra for pushing those premium phones?

"No, I don't like the IOS system, I would prefer a Samsung"

"Maybe the Samsung Galaxy S22 Ultra then? With 512GB of memory and 12GB of RAM. It's one of the best phones we have"

"Do you happen to have any folding phones?" I inquired.

"Ah, yes, indeed we do. The Galaxy Flip 5 and Galaxy Fold 5. The latter is a flagship phone, but it does come with a hefty price tag..."

"No worries, as long as it's a solid phone," I replied with a confident smile.

"Absolutely recommend the Fold, then!" She chimed in, eager to seal the deal without a change of heart.

"haha! I'll take it then"

With the selection made, the young receptionist, sporting long straight brown hair and deep blue eyes, began typing away on the keyboard with her slender fingers.

I provided her with the necessary info, and when I casually mentioned that I was purchasing the phone through my company's expenses, she turned and looked at me,

"You're quite young. You own a company already?" I could see a spark of curiosity in her eyes as if looking at a dreamy knight.

"Yes, I own a software company"

"That must be nice"

"Well... as long as there is profit"