I keep waiting for something to break. In my experience, when things are going this well, catastrophe is usually warming up in the wings. But the edge computing architecture is holding. Every test we throw at it—signal interference, hardware stress, even the simulated seizure events—the system handles without faltering.
“Stop staring at it like it’s going to explode,” Audrey says from her workstation.
“I’m not staring. I’m monitoring.”
“You’re hovering.” She rolls her chair over to look at my screen. “The encryption handoffs are clean. The processing latency is within acceptable parameters. Logan, it’s working.”
“For now.”
“For the past six hours. And the six hours before that. And the overnight run before that.” She bumps her shoulder against mine. “At some point, you’re going to have to accept that we might actually pull this off.”
She’s right. The numbers don’t lie. We’ve solved the security problem—really solved it, not just patched it. The edge computing approach means sensitive data never leaves the device. There’s nothing to breach because there’s nothing centralized to target. It’s elegant in a way that makes me want to print out the architecture diagrams and frame them.
Not that I would. That would be weird.
“I’ll accept it when the FDA accepts it,” I say. “Until then, I’m cautiously optimistic.”
“Cautiously optimistic?” She grins. “From you, that’s practically cartwheels.”
We work in comfortable silence for a while—or mostly silence. Every few minutes, Audrey glances at the simulation metrics, even though the data streams directly to her workstation. She can’t help it. Neither can I.
This is one of my favorite things about her—she doesn’t need to fill every moment with conversation. She understands that sometimes the best way to be together is to simply exist in the same space, each focused on our own tasks but connected by proximity. Even if ‘focused’ means compulsively checking the same numbers we checked five minutes ago.
We’re both disasters. Highly functional disasters. But with only a week left until our submission deadline, we need everything to go perfectly.
My phone buzzes. I glance at the screen and feel my stomach tighten.
Mother.
I could ignore it. I’ve ignored her calls before—usually when I’m in the middle of something important, which is most of the time. But something about today makes me want to deal with it. Get it over with. Close the loop.
“It’s my mother,” I tell Audrey.
Her expression shifts to concern. “Do you want privacy?”
“No. Stay.” I’m not sure why I say it, but it feels right. I don’t want to hide this part of my life from her anymore. “It’ll be quick.”
I answer the call. “Mother.”
“Logan.” Her voice is clipped, the way it gets when she’s been inconvenienced. “I’ve been trying to reach your brother.”
“I don’t have a brother.”
“Dominic. Your friend, who seems to think he has the authority to make decisions about our family’s finances.”
Ah. So that’s what this is about.
“What specifically is the problem?” I keep my voice neutral. Flat. The same tone I’d use discussing server maintenance.
“He’s frozen the travel account. Your father and I were supposed to fly to St. Barts next week, and the card was declined. Declined, Logan. Do you have any idea how embarrassing that was?”
“I can imagine.”
“This is unacceptable. I don’t know what you think you’re doing, but?—”
“I think I’m protecting my assets.” The words come out calm. Almost bored. “The travel account was funded through a trust I control. Dominic manages that trust at my direction. If he’s frozen the account, it’s because I asked him to review all discretionary expenditures.”
Silence on the other end. I can picture her face—the pinched expression she gets when things don’t go according to her plan.
