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The party was modest. It was also genuine.
The cake was cut, distributed, and devoured. People laughed, talked for a few minutes about something other than work, then drifted back to their labs and benches. At a research facility, science was the permanent topic. Birthdays were a rest stop.
Ryan and Chloe ended up alone at a corner table.
Chloe had a slice of chocolate cake on her plate and a moral dilemma on her face. She'd been training. Cake was not on the meal plan. The drumstick beside the cake, however, had been claimed without hesitation. The hierarchy of her appetites was clear, and cake was below fried chicken.
"Hypocrite," Ryan said.
"It's birthday cake. Birthdays are exempt."
"It's not your birthday."
"It's a related event."
Ryan let her win that one. His phone rang. Tom and Lisa, calling to wish him happy birthday.
His mother grabbed the phone first, before Tom could finish his opening greeting, and proceeded to deliver a comprehensive briefing on birthday traditions from approximately seven different cultures. Eat red eggs for longevity. Eat noodles uncut. Wear something new. Don't wash your hair. Make a wish before any candles are lit. Make another wish after they're blown out.
"Mom, I'm good. I had cake. There were candles. I wished. I'm fully birthday-compliant."
"Did you eat noodles?"
"I'll eat noodles tonight."
"Long ones?"
"Long ones."
Tom recovered the phone. "Ryan, ignore your mother. I sent you a Venmo. Just confirm receipt when you get the chance."
"Got it. Thanks."
"Two things, business-related. Mason told me the new arm prototype is essentially production-ready. The video yesterday was the working unit?"
"Yes. Functional spec is locked. Mason will send you the manufacturing drawings tomorrow."
"Patent strategy?"
"Patricia is handling international filings. She has counsel for both domestic and foreign jurisdictions. We'll be covered before launch."
Tom exhaled with relief. He'd been mentally preparing to call in favors from his old contacts. The thought of doing IP work as a guy whose previous job was running a barbecue franchise had not appealed to him. With Patricia handling it, he could go back to focusing on operations.
"Manufacturing strategy?"
"We outsource the mechanical components. Standard prosthetic factories can fabricate the titanium-printed parts and the actuator assemblies. The neural interface we keep in-house, but for now, we contract with Aegis Industrial for production. They have the cleanroom infrastructure and the security protocols."
Tom hesitated. "I don't love depending on them for the most critical component."
Ryan tapped the table. "Once we're shipping product, I'll apply for a startup loan to build our own neural fabrication facility. Bank financing, not Aegis funding. We keep our independence."
Tom nodded into the phone. He'd had several conversations with venture capitalists and bank representatives in recent weeks. They were practically lining up at his door. He'd turned them all down, mostly because the terms were predatory and partly because he wanted to see what Ryan would say before committing to anything.
Ryan understood the unspoken concern. He could ask Patricia for a no-interest loan and have it approved within a week. The Aegis system would happily extend Prism Sciences any financial support it requested, given the quality of the underlying technology. But that path made Prism Sciences an Aegis subsidiary in everything but name. Ryan didn't want that. He wanted Prism Sciences to be a real company, competing on its own merits, building its own reputation, surviving or failing on its own decisions.
If he used Aegis privileges to crush every domestic obstacle, Prism Sciences would never become globally competitive. It would be a privileged child, propped up by special access, incapable of operating outside of its protected environment. That kind of company didn't last. That kind of company definitely didn't go international.
Prism Sciences had to earn its position the hard way, or it didn't deserve the name.
Tom understood. After a moment, he pulled up the financial model on his end of the line.
"With the mechanical components outsourced and the neural interface contracted to Aegis, we have enough runway to ship the first production batch. After that, we're operating on margin. The hundred million from your bonus can fund the contract manufacturing setup and a fitting center in the city. It's tight, but it's workable."
A neural fabrication facility was a billion-and-a-half investment minimum. Chip components had to be sourced externally. The capital intensity was severe. Even with Aegis doing contract manufacturing for them, the per-unit cost on the neural interface alone would run into the high four figures.
Folding in standard R&D amortization (which Ryan didn't have, but other companies would), the per-unit cost would have been in the low six figures. Their pricing advantage was structural and overwhelming.
"How's Helios doing?" Ryan asked. "Anything in the news today?"
Tom had kept the alerts running. "Their CEO was on a livestream interview this morning. He said Angel will be in market within two months."
Ryan blinked. "Two months?"
"Two months from now. They went from investment to product launch in about three months total."
That was aggressive. Reckless, even. Real prosthetic launches required extensive clinical validation, regulatory approval, fitter training, supply chain qualification, and post-launch service infrastructure. Compressing that timeline to three months meant cutting corners somewhere. Probably everywhere.
"They're rushing because they want to ride the brand into the next funding round," Tom continued. "The CEO's been telegraphing a Series E announcement for months. Angel's launch is the proof point that justifies the new valuation. They need product on the market before the round closes, even if the product is half-baked."
Ryan thought about this. The world, he reflected, was a deeply visual place. Neural prosthetics looked futuristic. They smelled like science fiction. They were the perfect optical proof point for a tech company trying to convince investors it was building tomorrow. Helios was using prosthetics the same way Ryan had used Scrapper: as a spectacle that captured attention and converted it into momentum.
The difference was that Ryan had used the spectacle to generate Summon Points. Helios was using it to generate funding round valuation.
Ryan glanced at the system display. The progress bar had slowed since the troll farm shutdown. International discussion was sustaining the gain rate, but the domestic surge was tapering. A new spike of attention would help.
An idea formed.
"Dad. If we push hard, can we ship our first units around the same time as Angel's launch?"
Tom paused. "Two months? It's tight. Possible. Why?"
"Helios has been leeching off my visibility for weeks. Trolls, smear campaigns, narrative capture. They've spent millions trying to position themselves at the center of the neural prosthetics conversation. If we launch on the same day they do, we leech off their visibility right back."
Tom started to laugh.
"They build the stage. We perform on it. They hire the publicist. We get the headline. The press covering Angel's launch will have to cover our launch in the same article, because we'd be the obvious comparison case. Half the audience for their announcement becomes audience for ours, free of charge."
"You want to crash their party."
"I want to share their party. Since they came to mine first, it's only fair."
"What about positioning? They've got a billion-dollar marketing campaign. Our marketing budget is whatever we have left after manufacturing."
"That's the point. We don't need a marketing campaign. We need to show up at their event with a better product at a tenth of the price and let the comparison do the work. We don't need to convince anyone of anything. We just need to be in the same room."
Tom was quiet for a long moment. Ryan could practically hear him calculating logistics.
"It's aggressive."
"It saves us a year of brand-building."
"What if our product underperforms theirs in the public comparison?"
"It won't. But if it does, we ship a v2 in another three months. And if Helios's product is a marketing exercise dressed up as technology, which I'm fairly sure it is, our v1 will outperform their flagship and we'll permanently capture the narrative they've been trying to buy."
Tom thought about it.
"Mutual leeching," he said.
"Exactly."
"It's a good plan."
"I have my moments."
"I'll get on it. Two months. Tight schedule, but workable. I'll tell Mason today."
Ryan ended the call. Chloe was watching him with an expression that mixed amusement and respect.
"You just declared corporate war on a billion-dollar company," she observed.
"I declared a launch date."
"Same thing."
"Sometimes."
She finished her cake without further hypocrisy.
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