Chapter 66
(Mid-June 2007 – Brentwood, Century City, and FaceWorld HQ)
---
Wednesday – Brentwood – 9:43 a.m.
Jake Harper sat cross-legged in his office chair, one hand balancing a half-eaten croissant, the other already flying across his mechanical keyboard.
The room smelled faintly of butter and ink and freshly charged lithium batteries. A thin shaft of morning sun sliced across the hardwood floors, highlighting the hurricane of notes, sketches, and prototype boards scattered around him.
On his laptop screen: a blank interface, a scaffolded folder structure, and an encrypted shell, blinking patiently.
At the very top, in neat white font against a black background:
> FaceStore v1.0
No marketing team.
No middle managers.
No committees.
This was Jake's space. His idea. His code. His ecosystem.
He knew exactly what he wanted to build:
A native app portal, made exclusively for the FacePhone.
Clean, frictionless user experience.
Developer onboarding that took less than five minutes.
Full security sandbox to prevent malicious code.
Integrated payment rails using the existing FacePay modules.
A UI that felt like FaceWorld—sleek, inviting, futuristic.
Jake wiped his fingers on his jeans, set the croissant down on an old math textbook, and leaned into the screen.
No meetings today. No calls. No distractions.
He didn't even glance at his FacePhone buzzing on the desk.
By 11:20 a.m., the first client interface was rendering live in the dev environment. Simple. Elegant. Exactly how he pictured it.
By 1:00 p.m., the server backend was stress-tested and passing sandbox case simulations, the green indicators blinking like tiny celebrations.
By 3:00 p.m., the store could install and launch test apps without a hitch.
Jake barely paused to stretch his fingers.
He didn't feel tired. He felt alive.
Finally, by 5:15 p.m., he slammed the final key and hit Deploy to Internal Preview.
A single line of text appeared on the terminal:
> FaceStore v1.0 deployed. Ready for submissions.
Jake exhaled sharply and pushed his chair back.
He stretched his arms overhead until his shoulders popped, grinning like a kid who just pulled off a perfect heist.
"I just beat Apple to the App Store," he said under his breath, voice almost reverent. "By over a year."
He leaned back, staring at the ceiling, letting the magnitude of what he'd just done sink in.
The FacePhone was about to become more than a device.
It was about to become a universe.
---
Thursday – FaceWorld HQ – Executive Floor – 8:30 a.m.
Callum Knox stepped into Jake's office with a coffee in each hand—and immediately stopped short.
Jake stood at the glass wall, sleeves rolled up, black marker in hand, sketching a massive, tangled web of diagrams across the transparent surface.
Arrows. Circles. Labels scrawled in his sharp, fast handwriting:
> FacePad
FaceWatch
FaceBuds
It looked half like a business plan, half like a war strategy.
"You're not sleeping again," Callum said, handing him a coffee.
Jake didn't even glance away from the wall.
"I slept after I rewrote the mobile economy."
Callum huffed a laugh. "Fair."
Jake finally turned, eyes sharp but tired.
"We need more firepower," he said. "Engineers. Designers. Firmware specialists. Hardware freaks. I want the best."
"No LinkedIn job postings, huh?" Callum joked.
Jake shook his head.
"No resumes. No recruiters. No noise. I want you to poach them."
Callum lifted an eyebrow. "From where?"
Jake's grin was razor-sharp.
"Apple. Microsoft. Google. Sony. Console studios. Wherever the real innovators are hiding."
"And how exactly are we going to convince them?" Callum asked.
Jake wiped the marker across the glass with his sleeve, clearing a path between two idea clusters.
"Simple," he said.
"Full creative control. Massive bonuses. And... the chance to change the world."
Callum whistled under his breath.
"You're building an empire."
Jake didn't even blink.
"I'm already building it."
---
Friday – Private Office Suite – Off-Site in Century City – 10:15 a.m.
The suite looked like it belonged to some boring insurance agency—neutral carpeting, a few plastic plants, a bland view of traffic—but that was the point.
Anonymity.
Jake sat in the corner behind a cheap desk, a file folder open in front of him, while a hardware engineer from Apple sweated bullets across the table.
The shell company name was simple: JH Systems.
No link to FaceWorld. No link to Jake Harper.
"So," Jake said casually, flipping through the man's résumé without really reading it, "if you could redesign the iPod, turn it into something... more powerful... what would you do?"
The man blinked, caught off guard.
"Uh... wow. I've thought about that, actually. Something slim. Full glass. No buttons. Maybe stylus support for notes?"
Jake smiled faintly, tucking the résumé away.
"You're hired."
The man blinked again. "That's it? You don't even want to know my salary expectations?"
Jake stood up and offered a handshake.
"You'll be paid better than anyone you know. And you'll be building something bigger than you can imagine."
The engineer shook his hand, still half-stunned.
Jake didn't blame him.
After all, he could barely believe what was happening either.
---
Over the Next Two Weeks: The Recruits Arrive
The cavalry came quietly.
No press releases. No board meetings. Just talent.
A UI designer poached from Sony's PlayStation Portable team, who could think in thumb swipes and thumbsticks.
A hardware integrator from Palm, who could squeeze miracles into tiny circuit boards.
A voice assistant researcher from MIT Media Lab who spoke more code than English.
A firmware wizard who once made Nokia's ancient Symbian OS dance circles around iPhones that didn't exist yet.
Each of them walked into Jake's secret project expecting a paycheck.
Each of them stayed because they realized they were building the future.
Jake welcomed them with a single sentence at their first briefing:
> "We're going to overtake everyone. And you're going to help me do it."
No slides.
No corporate-speak.
Just vision.
And the fire in Jake's eyes was real enough to make them believe.
---
Meanwhile – FaceStore Internal Launch
Jake's personal playground—the FaceStore beta—was growing by the day.
The first five in-house apps passed review and went live on the internal servers:
1. JumpBot – a vertical jumper arcade game, simple but addictive.
2. Bit Racer – an endless, side-scrolling car dodger in 8-bit pixel art.
3. SoundPulse – a minimalist music visualizer synced to phone audio.
4. Notes+ – a voice-to-text notepad using the FacePhone's microphone array.
5. FaceWeather – a real-time weather app with a ridiculously clean UI.
Jake watched the testers—staff, family, even Charlie and Alan—play with the apps.
They were hooked.
Even Alan couldn't put JumpBot down after lunch.
Callum pitched the next phase while scarfing a sandwich in Jake's office:
"We should open it up—invite student devs, hobbyists, indie forums. Get a little chaos in the system."
Jake considered it, chewing on the idea like gum.
"Curated chaos," he said. "We whitelist submissions. Keep it clean. No shovelware crap."
Callum grinned.
"App store, but with standards."
Jake grinned back.
"Exactly."
---
Device Lab – Prototype Phase Begins
The hidden lab beneath FaceWorld HQ buzzed like a secret hive.
Under harsh fluorescent lights, the first physical seeds of Jake's empire were taking shape:
FacePad:
Thin, minimalist aluminum shell.
9.7-inch edge-to-edge LCD.
Early multitouch prototypes taped together by pure caffeine and ambition.
Stylus support in alpha testing.
FaceWatch:
A pebble-sized prototype with a custom haptic engine.
Basic health data tracking modules.
Bluetooth-style syncing so seamless it felt like magic.
FaceBuds:
Early lightweight, wireless earbud models.
Charging case still just rough sketches on Jake's whiteboard.
Custom audio drivers under design.
Every night, after the executives and managers went home, Jake slipped into the lab.
Testing.
Tinkering.
Writing notes with a laser pointer on the glass walls.
Fixating on details no one else even noticed yet.
He worked like a man possessed.
But there was a lightness to him now—a smile that sometimes slipped through when a prototype finally clicked the way he wanted.
This wasn't pressure.
This was creation.
---
Late Friday – Rooftop of FaceWorld HQ – 10:52 p.m.
The city sprawled out below them, a messy quilt of lights and smog and restless motion.
Jake stood at the edge of the rooftop, hands in his pockets, hoodie pulled up against the cool June breeze.
Beside him, Callum nursed a coffee cup like it was a lifeline.
"How far ahead of the curve do you think we are?" Callum asked, voice low.
Jake didn't hesitate.
"Two years minimum."
He turned slightly, the lights of LA reflected in his eyes.
"Five if we don't tell anyone what we're building."
Callum gave a low, disbelieving laugh.
"That's... terrifying."
Jake smiled faintly.
"Good."
The wind pulled at his jacket, but he stayed rooted there, surveying his empire in the making.
Out here, above the noise, he could almost hear it:
The future.
And it was coming faster than anyone could possibly imagine.