The first request Jackie made was full operational control of the business and all subsidiaries. He had the knowledge, ability and determination to see business succeed but there was no absolute guarantee.
‘You set up your standard contract with me as a contractor rather than as an employee. I’ll need to have full control off the business but there will be direct oversight from your part. In other words, you think I make mistakes you have the authority to step in and intervene. I’m not overly interested in share percentages, I want a role, not full ownership of this enterprise. Not that you’ve explained much to me. We still need to talk about the current market, logistics, existing coffee plantations and present business and environmental conditions. Tell you what, you draft up a contract which you’d usually sign with a regular...mortal on your part, hand it over to me and I’ll give it a check through. Then we can hash out the details. Thanks.’ said Jackie.
Even a new product line market tested, advertising boosted and backed by his former company Imperial Strikker would fail if consumers didn’t like the taste. He’d gone through the motions during this time as CEO of his own company of younger people with fresh ideas who’d had a push from marketing and sales for new products which were going to fail.
Brewing coffee was both a complex and simple affair depending on the quality and freshness of the coffee beans. As long as you knew what you were doing you could produce coffee. Even with a metal pot, crushed coffee grains and water you could produce a beverage which could be consumed.
Cowboy coffee was produced with roasted green beans with a pan over a campfire and grinding the beans to produce a bitter dark liquid which was popular with some but not with others. When producing coffee you needed to consider the quality you were going to offer then people understood what they were buying.
Trying ideas like mixing soda drinks with freshly boiled coffee without the benefits of sugar and additional flavourings wasn’t an issue of breaking rules but if it produced a drink that tasted disgusting then it didn’t matter how much a celebrity endorsed it.
Jackie watched the woman in the blue dress wave a hand in the air as a large roll of parchment appeared and unfurled itself to reveal blue letters as she nodded her head to him and then ignored his presence. She had left him with little to do aside from start a discussion, show impatience by asking further questions or simply letting him think to himself. Jackie preferred to choose the latter for now.
He was going to be entering a place that he knew nothing about aside from the fact there were gods and magic involved. He’d gained a minor advantage given his relative old age wisdom and decades of experience but Jackie was aware that to build a lasting business model required pure trust between all business partners.
In this situation, although he had initially agreed to sign a contract with the Goddess sitting opposite him who had created a strong impression, healed him and showed that she possessed magic power and the nature of a loving mother it didn’t mean that he was going to agree to all of the terms. She wasn’t the one who had originally contacted him, her son Linas had and he had been polite but uncertain. This woman had showed displays of magical power and a small degree of impatience.
Jackie didn’t overly care as long as she wasn’t from the rumoured Tourism Board which he had only been made aware of during his last few years in his position. An organisation from beyond their reality who made a living from worlds which were either on the path or had reached total planetary collapse. He didn’t know their motives, but only to ask when encountered with otherworldly beings.
Power and money give a lot of answers to a bored old man.
From his perspective he didn’t know if the woman calling herself a Goddess in front of him was telling the truth but she’d displayed nothing but concern and respect towards him. Presently he was sitting on the same oversized chair inside the Coffee House while the woman was running through entire lines of text on the unfurled parchment which was entirely incomprehensible to him. One of her fingers glowed as she drew marks on the text.
Jackie simply accepted the situation. He was overly tempted to take a look around the mockery of a Coffee House to identify improvements, check out the styles and even make himself a coffee with the machinery at the back. Granted, the fact that it had likely been built with magic made more sense than an entire interior design team coming in the space of thirty minutes to strip the carpet, remove all of the décor and furniture of his previous office and the install the new space.
Even as he was becoming an old man, his grandchildren and children had tried to get him to embrace new technology and ideas and he’d even been approached once by someone who’d been introduced by a family member for an insane idea of putting the souls of workers into virtual reality settings.
By making them effectively immortal they could work inside robotic bodies and then have accelerated downtime inside carefully constructed rooms like this Coffee House for example. Jackie had ignored the rantings of the man but had listened to the potential of it, in truth it was a valid idea but granted that there were already enough people who could freely work and head back home he had suggested to the man to consider it as an option for more hazardous environments like underground Mining Facilities. Or somewhere which humans were unable to operate, like the surface of an asteroid or a moon in deep space.
He’d cut the meeting short after the man talking about building a self-generating algorithm which would act as an eternal company, taking care of workers and recruiting new ones while building a viable business.
Jackie had little interest in wild theories regarding artificial intelligence and even though the man had given his business card, he’d directed him to one of the other rich people on the planet more interested in space exploration or work under the sea.
He’d liked talking to the wife of Liam Acqua more but she’d seemed less business minded and more project driven when they’d met a few years back at one of the largest gatherings for the rich and influential on Terrus.
Norm Vied was an odd man. Could be a genius but handing him over to Liam Acqua was the only way to get him out of my way. This Goddess is taking her time with the contract. Time for some Q&A before I make my own position clear. Always start from a strong position, then tear it to pieces and make it equal for both parties.
Jackie raised his hand into a fist and brought it to his mouth, coughing politely to draw the attention of the woman in the blue shimmering dress sitting opposite him.
Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.
‘Excuse me. You don’t appear concerned about my lack of surprise. You or your son restored my youth. I never asked for it and you mentioned a blessing and involvement with an immortal. To make it clear, your son Linas messed up and you’re trying to fix his mess. From one parent to another and with respect you’re indirectly hurting him. I know this from personal experience. He apologised and I accepted, no need for demanding or threats from me but who am I entering this agreement with? You or him?’ Said Jackie as he carefully examined the body language of the woman.
Goddess or not she hadn't tried to approach him directly and he doubted that she would have made such a mess of the Coffee House. The drink that she had provided him and refilled a few times times was proof of that.
She wanted quality and had only intervened due to a mistake on the part of her son, or there was a specific rule regarding the gods from her reality interfering with his. The laws of causality which she said she had broken to provide him with a single chilled coffee which she said she had purchased were something else.
All in all, it was far better for Jackie to focus on his strengths, the rest of it was just business on the side and could be worked out. Becoming young again hadn’t been part of his plans but he’d enjoyed his life enough that he didn’t need to relive his youth again or seek out new passions. Truthfully, if he’d been given a new chance then he’d love to do the same all over again. Starting out from nothing, building friendships, connections even family and the gradual challenge of seeing a business worked on with his two hands grow was a pure delight.
That coffee. Laws of casuality. She made it sound like a large deal but I could buy something like that or even brew my own given the right equipment and a little time. Not as good as it would have been but still good enough. Still...something was odd about it.
The taste of the drink had been decent but not outstanding. With a little time to literally digest the flavour In his mouth the aftertaste of the alcohol had been a little overwhelming on his throat. There had been something mixed in with it which had reacted to his senses wrongly. Not badly but something which he didn’t overly like.
Likely it was an after-effect of the energy surging through his own body. The water had been fresh though, far fresher than it had any right to be given the conditions of Terrus. In another time he would have been keen to talk with her about that but he’d had enough of the affairs of his own world.
The waters of the planet were suffering and needed to be fixed before the oceans themselves became contaminated but Jackie had nothing to do with worldly affairs. Not any more. He’d provided his kids and grandkids with enough money, power and resources in his own retirement package for them to find their own way in life.
The shift from the woman sitting opposite him was more than just her movement. There was a dryness inside his mouth and on the surface of his skin. Her eyes emitted a low glow which he’d never seen in a normal human before.
She stopped running her finger down the floating magical parchment and flicked it as the entire script dissolved into drops of barely perceivable drops of water which evaporated before they hit the concrete floor of the mock coffee house.
The area around them grew darker as she turned to face him directly and planted her hands on the oversized table causing it to creak as it was forced down.
‘Do you know how long it's been since a mortal talked to me in that tone?’ said the woman as she raised a hand and a globe of water formed around it.
She threw her hand casually and it flew through the air and smashed a hole in the wall behind Jackie. Narrowly missing his ear.
‘Nothing. Not a single flinch. What would you do for your children Mr Imperial?’ said the woman as her blue dress rippled and began to flow with a watery surface.
Her eyes began to glow a deep blue as Jackie experienced a tingling on the surface of his skin. Not painful but enough for him to notice. Like having a shower and then the temperature was either increased or reduced. Goosebumps appeared on the surface of his skin, even beneath his clothing. He flipped up the fur collar of his shirt to show his lack of interest.
The temperature inside the room wasn’t increasing which made him thankful as he’d been wearing a heavier coat over his jeans and fashionable fur and stripes t-shirt. He didn’t want to have to take it off and show any signs of discomfort, not when they were meant to be discussing a business contract.
Jackie responded without thought, without hesitation. Once he would have been scared or even overly curious. As it was he saw things differently now. Age amongst other things had changed him as a person.
‘My kids. All of them. And their spouses and their kids. I adopted them but raised them all on my own. And if you ever, ever threatened them I would do the same. But you're playing with me aren't you. Save the tricks for the young ones. The ones with bellies full of fire and fear. You and me? We're done with that. So stop your little display, call your son back here and fix this place. Working on a Coffee Shop doesn't mean working in a Coffee Shop.’ said Jackie.
Despite the growing darkness inside the mockery Coffee Shop Jackie smiled. He knew people well enough and this was a show, a test to see how he responded. She wanted him under pressure directly to gain better or more favourable terms for her son. There was the detail that despite her power she hadn’t told him to follow her or awoken him inside some different world and abandon him to his own devices.
Limits then. Everything had limits. I was close to reaching mine. Main reason for retirement and a decade spent back on my family farm before I passed on.
Pretending to yawn he leaned his arms on the table and rested his head on his hands. Closing his eyes he experienced the energy that remained flowing through his form.
He hadn't felt this way for over fifty years. Physically and mentally he was sharper but possessed the edge of experience and wisdom gleamed by an old man at the top of his profession.
Despite his interest in the idea of building an entirely new coffee empire he was going to do it more on his terms this time and work through the mistakes he had made before. Mostly, the hesitation and uncertainty of making mistakes and learning had taken him long enough.
The pressure and darkness inside the room dropped away as the woman stood up from her chair and waved a hand bringing a cool breeze inside the room and the smell of fresh flowers.
Jackie smiled and pulled the collar on his heavy coat up by his lapels. His gold rings clinked on his fingers.
‘With all due respect Goddess Vatn but if I’m not going to be your avatar then we don’t have anything further to talk about.’ said Jackie.
The woman snapped her fingers and the space around them shifted as Jackie’s vision began to blur and he slumped forward in his oversized Coffee House chair.
‘The hard way it is. Welcome in advance to the magical continent of Food and Drink, welcome to Odora.’