CHAPTER 131: OFFERING THE SIBLINGS A CHANCE

Liam and Lizzy sat on the same couch, a bit nervous as they looked at Ethan who had a small smile on his face.

They had no clue of whatever was going in his head, as it was almost impossible to read his face.

Ethan on the other hand was calmly looking at the two as he evaluated. The two were not part of the future in any meaningful way or at least in any way he remembered.

In the future, he never attended the get together, so he never met Liam again after university.

There was also no news of biotech geniuses in the future since he never heard of them, which meant that after the government seized their research, that’s where their story ended.

Well, not this time around.

He would be the author that would continue their stories no matter what, and he was even more sure of it now that he was looking at the two.

These two were far from average.

Ethan wasn’t worried about messing up the timeline, as he had been doing that the entire time, since his regression.

All he could do now was make sure he was prepared enough to handle whatever surprises the future brought about.

"So..." Lizzy started, "I heard from my brother that you were willing to help us."

"That’s correct," Ethan nodded.

"You do know that the government itself shut down our projects and basically every company blacklisted us right?" She asked again.

"Yeah, he also mentioned that." Ethan said as he leaned forward a bit, "but I also know that your idea is revolutionary, I know that it stood as a possible threat to their income sources so they decided to cut it off before it even started."

This got Lizzy quiet for a while before she asked, "and how exactly do you plan on helping us out."

"I won’t," his words immediately caused a frown to appear on both the siblings faces but before they could say anything, Ethan added, "but he will."

Putting his phone on the table before then, the screen lit up revealing an avatar with blue eyes and black hair, sitting on a large cube looking at them.

"Nice to meet you two," the avatar spoke, "I’m OmniTech, founder and owner of OmniTech Corp."

Ethan leaned back, watching their reactions with a smile on his face. There was no way for him to be in two places at once.... at least not yet, so he allowed Athena to take over the negotiation through his avatar.

The reaction of Lizzy though, was priceless.

"Y-you’re the owner of OmniTech?" She stuttered out, "THE OmniTech Corp?"

Even Liam, who had known that Ethan worked with OmniTech Corp, was surprised. He hadn’t expected Ethan to be able to casually call the owner.

At most, he expected Ethan to send their files and info to the owner and he’d make a decision, so actually get the owner here.... digitally, at least.

They were in no way prepared to meet the owner of OmniTech Corp, hell, they weren’t weren’t even properly prepared to meet Ethan.

"Yes, I am." Th avatar answered, "And I’ve read your entire research dossier. Impressive work, the both of you."

Lizzy blinked, visibly thrown off.

"You— You’ve read it? But that data was confiscated. We didn’t have a digital backup."

"That’s what the government wanted you to think," the avatar said, crossing one leg over the other. "Nothing is ever truly deleted. I simply retrieved it."

Liam’s mouth fell open slightly. "You hacked into government archives?"

"Well, I just knocked and the door was opened," OmniTech responded with a chuckle.

The two were at a loss for words, what kind of person just casually hacks into the government? THE government.

Maybe he was completely insane or something.

But they couldn’t exactly say that out loud to the person offering to change their future now, could they?

"So, my offer for you is simple," OmniTech continued, "OmniTech Corp is about to expand into the meditech field and we’re looking to recruit brilliant minds like yours."

"Isn’t meditech a big jump from Cyber security?" Lizzy asked, curious.

"It is," OmniTech nodded, his tone light but confident, "but innovation has never cared about boundaries. Cybersecurity, biotechnology, robotics — they’re all connected in the grander scheme of human evolution. "

"OmniTech Corp is determined to bring the future to humans and Meditech is the next step." He concluded.

Ethan calmly listened as Athena spoke through his avatar. This was more of less the response he would have given so he had no problem with what she said.

"I see," Lizzy muttered before turning to her brother who was silently thinking all this while.

Whatever decision she was going to make would be based on his thoughts, she didn’t want to force him into her decisions anymore.

Liam leaned forward, looking directly at the avatar before asking, "so what exactly would we be doing? What is our role in all this?"

"You two will be leading my meditech team," he answered, "you will be responsible for bringing our ideas to life."

"And what’s exactly in it for us?" Liam asked again.

"Resources, ideas, a generous salary and above all, freedom," he answered, "freedom to build and share your innovations to the world without anyone restricting it, not the government, not investors, not anyone else."

"You’ll be free to create to your heart desires and I’ll make sure you receive every resource you need."

Ethan took over from there, "so, would you like to work for OmniTech Corp?"

The two sat in silence for a while, clearly thinking about the offer. It sounded too good to be true, but at the same time what if it wasn’t.

What if this was the chance they had been waiting for.

After a short while, Lizzy sighed and responded, "can you give us a few days to think this through? We don’t want to just rush this decision."

"Understandable," OmniTech said, "whatever decision you come to, please make it know to Mr Carter, he should be in Boston for a few more days."

"We will," Liam said, and after his words, the screen went dark.

Ethan picked the phone back up and put it into his pocket, his calm smile never leaving his face.

"Well," he said as he stood up, adjusting his sleeves slightly, "I’ll give you two some space to think. I know it’s a lot to take in."

"Thank you for this, Ethan," Liam stood up with him and said.

"You’re welcome," He responded.

"Let me see you off," Liam offered as they walked towards the door.

They silently walked down the stairs, no words exchanged, which was normal for Ethan but not Liam as he had a lot to say but seemed to not be able to.

So in the end he just repeated, "thank you."

Ethan paused at the bottom of the stairs, his hand resting lightly on the railing.

He turned his head slightly.

"You already said that," he replied with a small, amused smile. "But you’re welcome, again."

Liam scratched the back of his neck, a little embarrassed. "Yeah, I know. It’s just... after everything that happened, all this just feels unreal, almost like a dream."

"Well, you better hope you don’t wake up," Ethan responded with a chuckle and Liam chuckled along.

The two continued down the stairs for a while longer before they finally arrived at the ground floor.

As they stepped outside, Liam finally asked again, "Ethan... why are you really doing this? You don’t strike me as the type who gets involved just to be nice."

This caused Ethan to stop in his tracks, his back to Liam who had also stopped.

"I’m not," he said simply.

Then he turned his head just enough for Liam to catch the edge of his calm, unreadable smile. "But sometimes, helping others aligns perfectly with my own goals. This is one of those times."

"I see," Liam nodded in understanding.

That made a lot more sense for someone like Ethan anyway so he wasn’t going to question it.

"I hope you two come to a decision soon," Ethan said as he opened his car’s door.

Liam stood there, hands in his pockets, staring at him for a moment. "We will. And Ethan..." He hesitated, then added, "If we do this... I won’t let you down."

"I know," he responded before entering the car, closing the door and driving away, leaving Liam standing there.

"Thank you, really." He muttered to himself before walking back into the apartment

----------

Back in the car, Ethan drove in silence, well, until Athena’s avatar popped up on his screen again.

{That went well,} she said.

"Yeah, " Ethan nodded before turning to her, "you handled it pretty well."

{Thank you,} she answered, {so, should I start drafting their contracts?}

"Yes," he nodded, "but first, inform Lillian of our new additions, I’ll explain in detail when I get back."

{Got it,} she answered.

The chance of the siblings accepting his offer was really high, the only question was how long it’ll take them to.