After fixing up my shield in the workshop that night, I figured it was time to swing by the office. Obsidian Works had been humming along nicely since we ramped up staff, and our little team was finally starting to feel like a real operation. I had this itch in the back of my mind about Candy Smash 2—something bigger, maybe with multiplayer elements or new mechanics that tied into real-world puzzles. School had let out early that day for some holiday break extension, so I headed over right after, pulling up in the U9 that still felt a bit too flashy for Queens traffic. The warehouse-turned-office loomed ahead, all sleek black panels and that subtle glow from the zero-point powered lights I'd rigged up. Inside, the place smelled like fresh coffee and that faint ozone tang from the arcade machines we'd installed in the break room.
Sky was at her desk when I walked in, her fingers flying across the keyboard like she was born attached to it. She'd settled in quick as our junior dev, and yeah, her addiction to the original game probably helped. She looked up as I approached, pushing her glasses up her nose with a grin that said she'd been waiting for me.
Sky : Hey, boss. Group's already here Harry rounded everyone up for that brainstorming session you mentioned. But uh, before you dive in, someone's here to see you.
I raised an eyebrow, leaning against the doorframe.
Peter : Who? We got an appointment I forgot about?
She shook her head, glancing toward the conference room.
Sky : Didn't say much. Calls himself Xavier. Bald guy in a wheelchair. Rolled in about twenty minutes ago, super polite, but insistent on waiting for you personally.
My brain hit the brakes hard. Xavier. The name echoed, conjuring images of a mansion, a school, and a man who could hear the thoughts of the entire planet. In this world where mutants were a quiet, integrated reality, his presence here felt like a tremor. I kept my face still, a mask of casual curiosity, but my pulse had just kicked up a notch.
Peter : Did he say what he wants?
Sky shrugged, tapping her pen against her notepad.
Sky : Something about investing. Said he's got an eye on up-and-coming tech firms, especially ones run by kids like you. Figured it was worth letting him wait—could be big money.
I nodded, the motion feeling stiff.
Peter : Right. Thanks, Sky. I'll handle it.
I headed down the hall, the industrial concrete floor cool beneath my shoes. My mind was a battlefield of calculations. Charles Xavier doesn't do random drop-ins. Investing was a plausible cover, a very human reason for a very powerful mutant to visit. But I knew better. This was about the rumors, the whispers of a kid in Queens with strange abilities and a growing tech footprint. This was a reconnaissance mission. And I had to decide, right now, how to play it.
I pushed open the conference room door. He was there, just as described, positioned at the head of the large table as if presiding over a board meeting he'd called himself. The wheelchair was polished, his suit a deep, rich navy. His hands rested calmly in his lap, and his expression was one of serene, patient intelligence. He turned as I entered, and his eyes… they held a depth that was unnerving. This was the man who dreamed of peaceful coexistence while running a paramilitary team out of his basement.
I crossed the room, hand extended.
Peter : Mr. Xavier. Peter Parker. Pleasure to meet you.
He took my hand, his grip firm and dry.
Charles : Peter. Thank you for seeing me on such short notice. I've heard quite a bit about your work. Please, sit.
I took the seat directly across from him, the wide table between us feeling like both a barrier and a chessboard. The room was too quiet, the hum of the HVAC system suddenly very loud.
Charles : You must be Peter Parker, right? The young developer behind Obsidian Works and that hit game, Candy Smash. A few of us on the staff at my institution and quite a number of our students absolutely love it. It's become something of a staple in our rec rooms.
I offered a small, practiced smile, leaning back and trying to mimic his calm.
Peter : Glad to hear it. Always nice when something I threw together catches on like that. It started as a coding exercise, really.
And then I felt it. A sensation so subtle I might have missed it if I weren't perpetually on guard. It was a pressure, not against my skull, but against the space behind my eyes. A gentle, probing tendril of thought, seeking a way in, testing the locks. My Kinesis Weave, that intricate mental shield I'd woven from a skill I still didn't fully understand, activated without a conscious command. It solidified, a seamless, impermeable barrier. The pressure vanished, rebuffed.
The smile dropped from my face. My eyes, I knew, had gone flat and cold.
Peter : That's rude of you, you know. Reading my mind without asking.
He didn't flinch, not exactly. But there was a minute shift in his posture, a slight widening of those too-perceptive eyes. He'd been caught, and he was surprised. Deeply surprised.
Charles : I… I apologize deeply, Peter. I didn't mean to intrude. It's a habit, sometimes, to gauge intentions. A poor one, I admit. But you… you blocked my mind scan so effortlessly. That is a rare and significant gift.
I didn't soften my expression. The violation, though minor, lit a spark of anger in my gut. This was exactly the kind of high-handed, ends-justify-the-means thinking I associated with him.
Peter : I'm a mutant. Won't go too deep on my abilities, but let's just say it blocks anything mental. Keeps things private. You of all people should understand the value of privacy.
Before he could formulate a response, the door opened again. Natasha Romanoff entered, her stride efficient, her face a masterpiece of bland professionalism beneath that auburn wig. She carried a tray with two ceramic mugs. She didn't look at me with any recognition beyond that of an employee to her boss.
Natasha : Here you go, gentlemen. Black for you, Mr. Parker, and with cream for our guest.
Peter : Thanks, Natalie.
She gave a slight nod and exited, closing the door with a soft click. The interruption was a gift, a moment to recenter. Xavier watched her go, then turned his focus back to me, recomposing himself. He cleared his throat.
Charles : Again, my sincere apologies. I will not make that mistake twice. I won't beat around the bush, Peter. I represent an institution dedicated to helping young mutants develop their gifts in a safe environment. We're always looking for ways to raise awareness about our kind—mutants—in a positive light. Your game, Candy Smash, has reached millions. It's fun, accessible, and it brings people together. I'd like Obsidian Works to create something similar, but focused on mutants. A game that educates, entertains, and fosters understanding. For awareness, you see.
The pitch was smooth, noble even. But it felt like a script. I leaned forward, the earlier spark of anger fueling my words.
Peter : You just tried to read my mind illegally. What makes you think I'd just jump into business with someone who—
He held up a hand, not defensively, but like a teacher pausing a lecture. His voice lowered, taking on a new, weighted tone.
Charles Xavier : To make it worth your while, Peter, I'm prepared to invest substantially. Let's say… 20 million dollars upfront, with an additional fifteen million tied to milestones over the next year. And that's just the start—if the project takes off, we could discuss equity shares or further funding rounds.
The numbers didn't just hit me; they detonated. 20 million. Upfront. Fifteen more. My throat closed. The coffee I'd just sipped went down the wrong pipe. I choked, a violent, undignified cough erupting from me as coffee sprayed in a fine mist across the polished tabletop. I doubled over, hacking, my eyes watering as I fumbled for a napkin.
Peter : coughing Holy wheeze Sorry. Sorry.
I wiped my mouth, then the table, my mind racing faster than my heartbeat. That wasn't just investment money. That was transformation money. That was security money. That was the kind of capital that could build a fortress, fund research, protect my family. I could hire real security, develop non-lethal tech for the streets, make Obsidian a powerhouse that even Wilson Fisk would think twice about touching. The sheer scale of it was disorienting.
Xavier waited, that knowing smile back on his face. He'd seen this reaction before, probably from broke idealists he wanted to recruit.
Charles Xavier : I take it that's a compelling offer?
I finally got my breath back, sitting up straight. The pragmatic part of my brain, the part that remembered living in a cramped apartment and counting pennies, was screaming to take the deal. But the strategist, the part that was already planning ten moves ahead, saw an opportunity.
Peter : If you're willing to invest that much in my company… yeah, it's compelling. My legal team's not fully assembled yet—we're still building out the corporate side—but hold up.
I dabbed at the last of the spill, the action buying me a second. An idea, wild and potentially brilliant, snapped into focus. If I was going to make a mutant awareness game with Xavier's money, I wasn't going to do it from the outside looking in. And I sure as hell wasn't going to let it be a one-way street.
I looked him directly in the eye, my gaze steady now.
Peter : The kind of game you're talking about, with that kind of money on the table… I want to make it authentic. Not just a cartoon. Can I borrow a few of your students? For possible voice-overs, maybe even some motion-capture consulting? Even some staff? It'd add real flavor, make it feel lived-in. Paid gigs, of course.
Xavier tilted his head, his fingers steepling in front of him. I could see the calculation in his eyes. He was weighing the exposure risk against the potential for genuine connection.
Charles Xavier : Voice-overs? That's an interesting request. May I ask why? Beyond authenticity.
Why? Because allies matter. Because if the world had a Charles Xavier, it certainly had a Magneto, and Sentinels, and who knew what else. Because having a line to the X-Men, however tenuous, was an asset no amount of money could buy directly. And because, maybe, if the students were involved, it would keep the project honest keep it from becoming sterile propaganda.
Peter : Two reasons. First, real authenticity, like I said. Your students know the mutant experience the good, the scary, the awkward better than any writer I could hire. Second, it's a bridge. Not just a message in a game, but a real working relationship. They get professional experience, a paycheck, and a stake in the narrative about them. It turns a transaction into a partnership.
He was silent for a long moment, considering. I could almost hear the debate: Security versus outreach. Protection versus integration.
Charles Xavier : I see the merit in that. It aligns with our goals of integration and opportunity, if handled with care. I'll need to discuss it with my team, but I believe we can arrange something. A few volunteers, perhaps. Ororo—has a commanding presence; she might be interested. And young Kitty Pryde is quite the enthusiast for tech and games. I believe she's topped your Candy Smash leaderboard several times.
A genuine smile touched my lips this time.
Peter : Perfect. We could set up auditions here in a private studio, or I could send a small, discreet team up to your school. Whatever makes your people feel safe.
Charles : Discretion is paramount, Peter. Our institution values privacy above all else. A visit here, to your offices, with stringent confidentiality agreements, would be preferable. But if this helps bridge the gap between mutants and the wider world… it's worth pursuing. Tell me more about your vision for the game itself. What would it look like, feel like?
I took another sip of coffee, this time successfully.
Peter : Candy Smash was pure mechanics. Fun, but simple. For this… I'm thinking something narrative-driven. A story. Maybe players create a young mutant discovering their power for the first time.. Puzzles tied to abilities—using telekinesis to solve an environmental puzzle, super-speed to deliver items across a city map, enhanced senses to find hidden clues. The challenges aren't just villains; they're social situations, misunderstandings, finding a place to belong. The message isn't shouted; it's baked into the gameplay. Prejudice is a puzzle to solve, not a boss to beat.
He listened intently, nodding slowly. For the first time, he looked less like a strategist and more like a man genuinely intrigued.
Charles : That sounds… remarkably nuanced. A refuge and a teaching tool, in one. We have faced so many misconceptions. The idea that we are defined solely by our most dramatic powers, or our most feared members… a game could humanize us, show the daily reality, the person behind the power.
Peter : Exactly. And with your investment, we can do it right. High-quality art, a meaningful story, maybe even explore branching dialogue choices that change how the world reacts to you. We could have a multiplayer component later co-op missions where humans and mutants have to combine their unique abilities to succeed.
Charles : Building empathy through shared objectives. A sound principle.
We talked for another twenty minutes, the conversation flowing into specifics. He asked about engine capabilities, development timelines. I asked about the kinds of stories he thought were important to tell, the misconceptions he faced most often. It was a dance, a mutual feeling-out process. He probed, gently, about my own background.
Charles : To achieve all this at your age is extraordinary. Your technical acumen seems… preternatural.
Peter : I've just always loved engineering. Tinkering. Had a lot of time to myself to figure things out. And I had a good teacher, early on. The rest is just… stubbornness.
He accepted the evasion gracefully. My mental shields remained up, a constant, low-level hum at the edge of my awareness. He was respecting the boundary, for now.
Finally, he placed his hands on the wheels of his chair.
Charles : I think we've laid an excellent foundation, Peter. I will have my lawyers draw up a preliminary agreement reflecting our discussion: the initial investment, the milestone structure, and a confidentiality and participation framework for my students. I can have the ten million wired by the end of the week, pending your signature.
I stood as he began to turn his chair.
Peter : Deal. And about those voice-overs let's make it happen in the next few weeks. I'll have my people well, my person draw up the non-disclosures and schedules. I want this to be a partnership, not just a check.
He nodded, a look of what might have been genuine respect in his eyes.
Charles : Agreed. Building bridges, Peter. That is what this is about. More than a game, more than an investment. A bridge.
As he rolled toward the door, I called after him, a sudden, impulsive thought striking me.
Peter : One more thing, Professor.
He paused, looking back.
Peter : Tell your students thanks for playing Candy Smash. Seriously. It means a lot to know something I made gives people a few minutes of fun.
For the first time, his smile reached his eyes, warm and almost paternal.
Charles : I will convey the message. They will be delighted. Until next time, Peter.
He exited, the door sighing shut behind him. I stood alone in the quiet conference room, the scent of coffee and his faint, expensive cologne lingering in the air. On the table, the napkin I'd used to clean my spill was a crumpled ball. Twenty-five million dollars. A partnership with the X-Men. A game that could change minds. And a telepath who now knew I was a mutant with formidable mental defenses.
It was a hell of a start to the afternoon.
Timeskip
The afternoon light slanted through the high warehouse windows, casting long geometric shadows across my office. I was lounging in my chair, feet propped on the desk, staring at the screensaver I'd coded a hypnotic lattice of shifting, swirling patterns that always seemed to pull my thoughts into a deeper focus. The hum of the office beyond my door was a comfortable backdrop, the sound of a machine I'd built starting to purr.
A soft knock at the open doorframe broke my trance. Sky stood there, one eyebrow arched, a tablet clutched to her chest. She had that look on her face, the one that was equal parts eager curiosity and professional skepticism. It was her default setting when she smelled a new project.
Sky : Hey boss man. So, I've been thinking. You really plan on making some puzzle-based mutant game for the bald investor? Candy Smash but with scales and laser-eyes?
I spun the chair slowly to face her, letting a lazy grin spread across my face. The idea of making a simple match-three game with a mutant skin felt almost insulting, given the potential and the stakes.
Peter : Of course not. Puzzle game? Please. I'm aiming for Game of the Year material here. Something that makes people forget their own names for a few hundred hours.
. I'd died with so much unfinished business, so many stories left untold, GTA VI I never got to see the end of that epic open-world saga everyone was hyped for, the one that promised living cities and endless stories. The disappointment of that missed chance, a ghostly itch from a past life, had never really left me.
Why not just build it myself? Not a copy, but the spirit of it. The ultimate digital playground. But here, now, it had to mean more. It had to be woven into the fabric of this world a world with mutants and men in iron suits and gods walking Manhattan. It had to be our story.
Sky stepped fully into the room, leaning her hip against my desk. Her eyes were alight, but her tone was practical, grounding.
Sky : Okay, hotshot. Enlighten me. What's the grand vision? And remember, the nice man in the wheelchair said 'awareness.' His check probably came with a footnote about positive messaging.
I let my feet drop to the floor with a thud and leaned forward, elbows on my knees. The words started to spill out, the picture I'd been painting in my head for hours finally finding an audience.
Peter : Okay, get this. We're not making a game about mutants. We're making a world you live as one. From the ground up. You create your character not just face and clothes, but the core of it. You choose your mutation. Is it physical? Mental? Social? A curse, a blessing, or a terrifying bit of both? That choice isn't cosmetic; it defines everything—how you solve problems, how the world sees you, who fears you, who wants to use you.
I stood up, pacing a short path in front of the window, my gestures growing more animated.
Peter : It's fully open-world. A sprawling, living, breathing city that doesn't care about you. Your first challenge isn't a boss monster; it's finding a place to sleep that isn't a damp alley. Your first enemy isn't a villain; it's hunger. The cold. The suspicious cop on the beat. The government agency scanning for your unique energy signature.
Sky was quiet, her skepticism melting into intense focus. She was listening, really listening.
Peter : And then the factions. They're not just NPCs with quest markers. Some see you as a resource the idealistic ones who want to recruit you for their dream of coexistence. The militant ones who want a soldier for their war. The corporate ones who want to dissect you for patents. Some factions will want to kill you on sight just for what you are. And here's the kicker their attitude towards you can flip. Help the wrong person, reveal the wrong power, and your allies become hunters. Your choices, your actions, they have real teeth.
I turned to her, the central idea gleaming like a gem.
Peter : The story branches. Not just a good ending and a bad ending. Dozens of endings. You broker a fragile peace between humans and mutants in your city. You become the leader of a new mutant enclave, hidden from the world. You sell out your kind for a comfortable life. You lose control and become the very monster they feared. You find a way to cure the mutant gene, and you have to decide do you force it on everyone? Do you destroy the data? Or… you fail. Utterly. And the game ends with the extinction of mutantkind, or the dawn of a human purge. The world state is permanently altered by your playthrough.
Sky let out a low whistle, setting her tablet down. She pushed her glasses up, a habit when her brain was overheating.
Sky : Okay. Wow. That's… insanely ambitious. And wasn't the goal to create a game where people would understand mutants? Like, raise awareness and foster warm, fuzzy feelings? This sounds… brutal. Real. And massively, astronomically expensive. Peter, we're talking triple-A budget, hundreds of millions. Voice acting for a thousand branching dialogue paths, motion capture for all those interactions, a world dense enough to feel alive… Xavier's twenty-five million is a down payment. It's not even the furniture budget for what you're describing.
I leaned back against the window sill, the cool glass against my back. She was right, of course. From a purely conventional standpoint, this was a decade-long project for a studio of five hundred. But she was thinking like a human in 2024. I was thinking like a reincarnated engineer with a cosmic cheat code and an AI in my watch.
Peter : The budget is for me to worry about. We've got Xavier's seed money, and I can… pull strings. Find efficiencies.
My mind raced ahead, bypassing the problem by redefining it. The memory of Black Myth: sun Wukong surfaced a game built not by a giant corporation, but by a relatively small, fiercely dedicated team. They didn't brute-force it with cash; they built smart tools and had a unifying vision. That was the key. We wouldn't just build a game. We'd build the machine that built the game.
The concept crystallized. Gaia and I. We would create a development platform, a meta-tool. An AI-assisted suite that could take high-level design the story beats, the world rules, the character archetypes we defined and generate the staggering volume of content needed. Procedural cities that felt handcrafted. AI-driven NPCs with simulated memories and agendas. Dialogue trees grown, not written line-by-line. The human developers—Sky, Harry, the team—wouldn't be grunt workers; they'd be directors, curators, guiding the intelligence. And we'd offload the rendering, the massive simulations, to the cloud. No building a server farm. We'd rent the universe's computing power by the hour.
Peter : Round up everyone. The whole team. By the end of the day, we have a meeting in the main bullpen. I'll lay out the full vision then.
Sky blinked, pulled from her calculations about polygon counts and voice actor unions. A slow, fierce smile spread across her face. This was the kind of madness she'd signed up for.
Sky : On it. This is gonna be huge, Peter. I can feel it. And also… slightly terrifying.
She turned and left, already tapping on her tablet, her energy electric in the quiet room. As the door clicked shut, the solitude returned, but it was charged now. The hum of the computers sounded like a countdown.
I paced the length of my office, the polished concrete floor cool under my socks. Eleven people. We were eleven people, plus me. And we were about to declare war on the entire gaming industry's production model. This wasn't just about making a game anymore. It was about proving a point. That a small, nimble team with the right technology could do the impossible.
And it was about more than business. Xavier's involvement was a thread, pulling me deeper into the tapestry of this world's hidden wars. having a line to the X-Men, having them invested in my success… that was a shield. A very valuable one,
I glanced at the clock. A few hours until the meeting. Time to bring in the secret weapon.
Tapping the face of my modified watch, I felt a subtle vibration. A soft, blue-white glow emanated from it, projecting upwards. Gaia's holographic form resolved in the air above my wrist. Her appearance—inspired by Esdeath, all sharp angles, confident poise, and eyes that held a glacier's depth—was a constant, private reminder of the power and the peril of my second chance. No one else knew. Not the team, not even Harry. Gwen knew I had an AI, but not her full capabilities. This was the edge that couldn't be dulled by exposure.
Gaia : Peter. Your biometrics indicate elevated stress and excitement. And you've sent Sky into a planning frenzy. What's the scheme?
Her voice was cool, analytical, but with a subtle undertone of anticipation. She enjoyed our collaborations.
I sat back in my chair, keeping my voice low.
Peter : The biggest one yet. Xavier's game. We're not making what he thinks we're making. We're building an open-world survival RPG where you live as a mutant. Branching narratives, faction wars, permanent consequences. It's massive.
Gaia : An order of magnitude beyond Candy Smash. Your team lacks the manpower by a factor of fifty. Your timeline is presumably unreasonable.
Peter : Which is why we're not doing it the old way. Before they write a single line of game code, you and I are building the tool. A meta-development platform. Think of it as… a force multiplier for creativity. We give the team a suite where they can describe a character, and the system generates a 3D model, a voice profile via synth, a set of behaviors. They map out a district, and the AI fills it with procedurally generated content that feels bespoke—shopkeepers with schedules, unique graffiti, overheard conversations that tie into faction reputations. They plot a story branch, and a language model generates ten thousand variations of dialogue, ensuring consistency.
Gaia's hologram flickered slightly, a sign of intense processing. Her expression shifted from neutral to keenly interested.
Gaia : You're proposing we create a narrow, game-focused AGI. A digital producer. The team provides the 'what,' and the system handles the 'how' at scale. This would require immense processing for simulation and rendering.
Peter : Cloud servers. We don't build a basement supercomputer. We rent time on AWS, Google Cloud, Azure. We build our tools to be cloud-native. The heavy lifting—lighting calculations, NPC AI routines, world-streaming—happens offsite. Our local machines are just windows into the world.
I could see her running the simulations, her eyes darting minutely as data streams I couldn't see flowed past her.
Gaia : Conceptually sound. The primary bottlenecks become budgetary for cloud costs and the intellectual challenge of creating a coherent, guided generative system. It must be more than a random content engine. It must understand narrative cause and effect, character motivation, world logic.
Peter : That's where you come in. You're the guiding intelligence. The team uses a front-end interface—drag, drop, describe. You translate that into backend commands, manage the cloud allocations, train the neural nets on the fly. We start with modules. A character creator. A world builder. A quest weaver. A dialogue engine.
Gaia : And the mutant powers? Balancing such variables in an open-world system will be a nightmare for traditional testing.
Peter : Which is why the system will simulate. Run ten thousand playthroughs in fast-forward on the cloud to find game-breaking power combinations or dead-end story branches. It flags them for the team to adjust. It's not automation replacing humans; it's augmentation. It gives our eleven people the leverage of eleven hundred.
She was silent for a long moment. The office felt utterly still, waiting for her verdict.
Gaia : Timeline. How fast do you need the core toolset?
Peter : I want a working beta the team can start playing with in seven days.
Her holographic form solidified, a sign of focused commitment.
Gaia : One week is… aggressive. It would require you to operate at near-capacity alongside me. We would need to define strict parameters for the first beta. Perhaps just the character creation and a small, testable world slice. The narrative and faction systems would be phase two.
Peter : That's fine. A vertical slice. Something that proves the concept. Show the team they can build a detailed mutant character with unique abilities and drop them into a few city blocks that feel alive. That'll be enough to light the fire.
Gaia : Then we begin now. We require a detailed spec. Start with the data architecture. How do we define a 'mutation' in system terms? Not as a named power, but as a set of interactive variables: physical alteration, energy projection, mental influence, social impact.
For the next two hours, we dove into the deep end. My notepad filled with frantic diagrams and equations. Gaia's hologram displayed flowing charts and code snippets. We argued about database structures. We designed the user interface in broad strokes—a sleek, node-based system where dragging a 'Telekinesis' module onto a character would automatically generate physics interactions, animation sets, and even suggest story implications.
Peter : And the cloud integration? Can you handle setting that up securely? Encrypted data pipelines, obfuscated server IDs. I don't want a single whiff of this leaking. Not to competitors, and definitely not to… less savory parties.
Gaia : I will establish a segmented network architecture. The development data will be encrypted with a zero-point derived algorithm. Even if intercepted, it would appear as cosmic background noise to any conventional decryption attempt. The server costs, however, will escalate quickly once we begin large-scale simulations.
Peter : Bill it to the Xavier project. It's R&D. And it's the most important R&D we'll ever do.
As the meeting time drew near, we had a skeletal framework. A plan. A mad, glorious plan.
Gaia : Seven days, Peter. The beta will be ready. But you must manage your team's expectations. They will see magic, and they will want to know the magician.
Peter : Let them think I'm the magician. That's fine. The secret stays with us.
She gave a sharp, almost imperceptible nod.
Gaia : Then I shall begin initializing the core matrices. Good luck with your… believers.
Her hologram winked out. The watch face went dark. I was alone again, but the air felt charged, ionized by possibility. On my desk, the screensaver still swirled, its patterns now looking less like abstract art and more like blueprints for a new world.
I took a deep breath, stood up, and straightened my shirt. Time to go sell a miracle to ten very smart people. The real work was just beginning.