*Bum…Bum…Bum…Bum…*

The chime for the first ever BlackHole Television Broadcast started and Lane’s chair swiveled around of its own accord to reveal Lane seemingly lost in a book on Cultivation. Even this was a marketing ploy, as the book she was reading would be changed with each daily broadcast. Lane felt this would show yet another resource their conglomerate had, one that they would soon make accessible to the public through a book rental offered in a subscription-based library held inside BlackHole’s primary storefront.

The books were being set up with teleportation tags, that would teleport the books back onto the shelves when the book was finished being read, the time on the rental elapsed, or if the contents of the books were being copied in any way. They could not of course prevent an individual from memorizing the content, but that wasn’t something they wanted to impede in the first place.

“Oh, it must be time already. Welcome, my fellow stargazers, to our first ever private broadcast.” Lane smiled, and had to forcibly keep herself calm as the number in the corner of her Overlay rose higher and higher. The number of viewers had already tripled what she’d been told to expect from a new company’s launch on the realm web, as new platforms shouldn’t expect to compete with inter-realm apps such as Chatter, and, Holo-Vision. Yet her number kept rising by the blink. Jasmine worried over lane drawing in the wrong kind of attention from their competitors, especially after their compound had been attacked, that she’d forced Xani to upgrade the security systems Lane now used multiple times.

“I know, I know, everyone is wondering why I would dare make such a brazen move as to remove our content from the big name broadcast stations and popular apps, and I’m sorry to admit this but, we are growing beyond what they can offer us. Until they either admit that we deserve a percentage of each of their companies, or give us larger payouts for the numbers we bring to their networks, all we can do is build our own platform, so let's hope they wise up and see the error of their ways before we are too big to need them.”

Various images began to flash around her. Arson being the number one contender in the Tournament of Scions. Troy being the runner up. A mixture of them causing absolute havoc was displayed. Lane revealed unseen footage of the couple performing a heist cleverly disguised as them actively participating in a battle Royale.

Gotcha… Lane’s smile deepened when the numbers spiked. Her words about the various networks was absolute rubbish. Lane had turned down more deals in the last fortnight than she’d seen given to any idol across their entire career, from big and small entities.

“On another note, we do have some absolutely fantastic material for you all today, including the debut of our newest fighter, Quest!” Music played as flashes of footage of Aura in her newly developed character presented her fighting various opponents. The musou black suit she wore was company standard, yet the musou black mask she wore that made her entire left eye black and the right eye red, gave her an ominous presence, especially when accompanied with her Musou black wig that Axis designed with the help of Xani and Jasmine. The hair set in a continuous motion around her head, appearing as if she was submerged in water. Long strands spread in every direction giving her a ghostly visage.

The only differences between her suit and Khalif’s being that she wore a skirt. High top sneakers just released by BlackHole Conglomerate instead of dress shoes. As well as her gloves were fingerless and the same crimson red as the eye of her mask.

“Ow, that looked like it hurt,” said Lane. The holograms around her showing a man getting the teeth kicked out of his mouth in slow motion before the images on screen changed again.

“Sparks, I know we paid that guy a lot for his dental bill, but before we get into the deadly excitement, we have some messages from our sponsors!”

A new commercial played. It displayed not only clips of the twins fighting intruders within the villa, but also with them standing in flames as the intruders ran away. It continued to show them battle against Aura as Quest, fighting the twins in a fight that had actually gotten out of control, the commercial becoming a film of a real fight between the twins and Quest, Aura barely making it out of the fight alive.

Rob walked on screen and a round of cheers went out, and Lane rolled with the interruption as if nothing out of the normal was occurring, an improvisation that had started from thin air.

“Hey, what's up?” Lane asked. She turned to Rob who smiled and leaned in to whisper in her ear.

“Bobby from RaidCorp is on the line, he wants to talk, he said put him on a Live Chat, RN, I don’t know what that means but Carter said we should pass the message along and you should let me mingle with the crowd a bit. He’s not forcing it on you just giving out options?” Lane nodded giving it her best thinking face and looked out at the audience who paid to be at the recording.

“I’d be terrible if I didn’t let you guys have some of our famous food, wouldn’t I…?”

The crowd erupted in roars of celebration, Lane smirking and giving Rob the stage with a simple gesture.

“Hello all. Don’t mind me. I have a treat for you all, just ignore me. Lane, can I start you with some coffee? I know this is going to b a long opening for you?”

“Yes please.” Rob nodded at her and turned to the crowd.

“Let’s begin,” Rob said to himself and cheers came from the crowd again. A series of tables were brought out by a class of well dressed children with the word ABLE stitched into their collars.

When in place the children’s colorful clothing made a pattern with their positions set perfectly. The hovering tables and the clothing creating a colorful wormhole.

The Children all artfully exiting the stage. Acrobatics, abilities and artful stage tricks making their disappearance quick enough to leave some wondering if they were holograms as well. A building excitement grew through a thrumming of oohs and aahs, and Lane found herself equally captivated, her eyes as wide as the crowd members' watching realm-wide and beyond.

Rob closed his eyes walking to the center of the tables. Once in the center, Rob spread his arms wide and spoke.

“Thank you, boss. Without you, this wouldn’t be possible.” A flutter of birds exploded out from the center of Rob's body, all the flock made of simmering water. The action accompanying his movements, the crowd screaming in momentary alarm.

“Again, don’t mind me. Just continue to make your selections, The audience all presented with menus that were sent to their Overlays..

The fluttering birds all transformed into hands, forced to catch the equipment that shot from Rob’s fingertips. Cooking knifes, skillets, pots and more were placed onto the hovering tables all around him and Rob began to work.

“You guys heard him right, he said ignore him but I don’t know if that is even possible,” Lane said blinking slowly. The crowd laughed and Rob’s hands went to work alongside him.

A fresh cup of hot coffee was placed on her desk.

“Pretty sure you don’t add anything, right?” Lane nodded at Rob and the show continued. A boiling hand of water holding a skillet allowed Rob to cook at his table, and he finally opened his eyes.

“I actually only became able to do that recently, you know?” said Rob, glancing back at Lane.

“Really?” Rob nodded at Lane and her eyebrows rose.

“What inspired such a seeming breakthrough?” asked Lane, the number count in her vision still growing, yet she no longer gave it any mind, the digits tripling again since the last time she looked.

“I was talking with Carter and asked him a question that had been bothering me for a long time, and he gave me such a simple answer, you wouldn’t believe it, but it just seemed to fit my dilemma.”

“Well, what did you ask him?”

“Oh my question, it was how he was able to think about so many things all at once,” responded Rob. His full attention on hands moving as if they had minds of their own as they all moved through the air around him. Lane looking between the crowd and Rob and back before she closed her eyes a moment, shook her head, and made a strange face.

“Rob, you can’t just lead us on like that and leave us hanging?” Rob glanced back at Lane, smiled and nodded, and went back to cooking, plates now moving through the air, landing on tables being set for the audience by ABLE members.

“Rob…?”

“Yes,” said Rob looking back at Lane as he continued to cook.

“You want me to cook you something on the side, your favorite maybe?” Lane shot Rob a scrunched face, continuing to shake her head, staring at the laughing audience.

“No,” said Lane looking Rob in the eyes and sighed..

“What did Carter say to your question? We want to know the advice he gave,” asked Lane looking back into the crowd that roared with cheers.

“Oh, his answer, like I said, you’ll never believe this, he said to stop thinking about life as a system of singular steps taken at one time, one after the other, and think of life as an infinite number of things you can do all at once. Then he looks me dead in the eyes and said seriously, you can wiggle your fingers and toes all at once, and even that that isn’t doing 20 actions at the same time, you're both moving and thinking about moving, and that should be enough to prove you can at least do 4 things at once,” said Rob with a chuckle.

The crowd looked around confused at one another and Lane once more scrunched her face in her own bout of confusion. She raised her hand into the air and began to count.

‘One, thinking, two, moving, what are the other two things,” asked Lane wiggling two fingers on the same hand she counted with.

“Yeah, I asked the same thing,” Rob said and looked up at the crowd with a huge smile before he continued, the entire audience roaring with applause as he spoke next.

“He just looked me in the eyes and said, "living and breathing, baby, living and breathing".”

Lane’s show continued to host an entire photo shoot. Lane was surprised to see a fearsome looking Ash forced onto the runway by her sister Axis, and a few more surprises she wasn’t ready for, but made into special events for the crowd both watching abroad and right before her. She hadn’t even announced that there would be a second episode of her new show and the tickets were sold out by special request halfway through her broadcast.

It was then that another attendant walked out on stage just as the show began and Lane paused looking at the attendant. The young man one of Lane’s longest assistance approaching slowly with his eyes wide and his hands up as if Lane could pull out a gun and shoot him at any moment.

“Yes, darling, is everything okay? You all have given me more surprises than any one person deserves for even their birthday. I swear today has already been a full on rollercoaster…” Lane giving the man a slight side eye just as he got to her desk, and leaned in to whisper. His voice as loud as if he were being amplified through the speakers of the same system that every guest and Lane’s own voice boomed out of for the audience to hear.

“Bobby is now calling you from the head RaidCorp network offices, he’s in conference with their broadcast admins.”

“You all want to talk to Bombshell Bobby with me for a moment, guys? I don’t know what’s going on over there, but it may be fun, what do you all think?” Cheers roared out, and Lane gave her assistant a nod and smile.

“Woman!” Bobby the announcer’s voice roared through the speakers.

“Yes, Bobby,” Lane responded normally.

“What are you doing having all this fun, and you didn’t invite nobody name Bobby,” yelled Bobby in a ramble of feigned rage.

“Don’t lie on my name like that, Bobby, you can rewind my broadcast I did say that I invited you but there was some sponsorship issue you were facing... didn’t I guys?”

The crowd cheered happily and Bobby spoke once again. Lane came to her feet and walked to stand in front of the audience putting her hands on her hips, cocking her head as she looked up into the air as if speaking to someone on a hill above her.

“I’m just annoyed I couldn’t come, woman. I’m under contract, but I am being told that I can double what has been offered to you previously,” responded Bobby. Lane nodded. She then turned her back to the crowd, nodding slowly as she looked down. Holograms to either side of her, showing a close up of her thinking face. Nervous murmurs going through the crowd until Lane looked over her shoulder, high up into the air and spoke simply.

“Nope..”

“What? Come on, it will be so much fun, me and you can do so much together, and I can even hear them whispering about quadrupling your offered amount. See? Look... they done passed me a little piece of paper that has a four and a little x after it, please.” Another thrumming of oohs went through the crowd and Lane looked down at the floor, once more nodding and thinking. Before she looked high up into the sky, and stopped nodding to herself.

“Nope…”

“I got another piece of paper with a ten and a little x. Woman, I don’t know what number they put on your contract but woo, that ain't normal for any newbie…”

“Hmm, I tell you what, send me your contract and I’ll ask Carter to buy it out and we can co anchor,” Lane said looking back at her head assistant. The young man gave her a nod and darted off.

“I don’t think you guys should try, I make great money here, and you may be setting all time highs with your first broadcast, but you all are still new, and have a lot of eyes on you in high places, I just don’t want you to live through the same meteoric crashes that I see many new talents, with as much promise as you and I combined, go through most times.”

“I’m built for this, Bobby, and I don’t know what you mean by all time highs, it's just me and my audience having a good time,” Lane said with a chuckle.

“”I bet you haven’t looked at your cast numbers since this morning, have you?” Lane shook her head and she looked in the corner of her Overlay, and gawked as her jaw dropped open slowly.

“What the bloody *****!”